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ESSAYS 



ON 



Educational Refoemers. 



B. J 

ROBERT HEBERT J^UICK, 

M.A. TBIN. COLL. CAM., LATE SECOND MASTER IN THE SURREY 

COUNTY SCHOOL, AND FORMERLY CURATE OF 

ST. MARK'S WHITECHAPEL. 



4^ 



READING-CLUB EDITION. 




SYRACUSE, N. Y.: 

O. W. BARDEEN, PUBLISHER. 

1886. 






Copyright, 1886, by C. W. Bardebn, 



PUBLISHER'S mm 



The plates from which this work has hitherto been 
jsued having become so worn as to necessitate renewal, 
have made the page uniform with the " Reading-Club" 
ditions of Sully's " Outlines of Psychology with special 
eference to the Theory of Education," Tate's " Philoso- 
hy of Education," Payne's " Science and Art of Edu- 
ation," DeGraff's " School-Room Guide," etc. 

I have also inserted in brackets translations of the 
nany Latin, French, and German quotations. Prof, 
^uick wrote for the English schoolmaster, who is usually 
I university graduate, little thinking that the book 
i«rould be purchased in thousands by the common-school 
teachers of America. These passages in foreign tongues 
liave heretofore made many paragraphs unintelligible to 
these readers, who will appreciate the fact that this edi- 
tion may be understood from preface to finis by those 
who have no other language than English. 

The Index is entirely new and much fuller than in 
former editions. Especial pains has been taken to facil- 
itate ready comparison of different views upon the same 
subject, and especially to indicate the passages where 
reference is made to the influence of one reformer upon 
others who followed him. 

I have also added a few bibliographical notes, and in 
general it may be said that everything in brackets [ ] is 
an addition of mine to the matter of previous editions. 
Syracuse, N. Y., March 15, 1886. 



PREFACE. 



"/i{ is clear that in whatever it is our duty to act, those matters 
also it is our duty to study. ''^ These words of Dr. Arnold's 
seem to me iDcontrovertible. So a sense of duty, as 
well as fondness for the subject, has led me to devote a 
period of leisure to the study of Education, in the practice 
of which I have been for some years engaged. 

There are countries where it would be considered a 
truism that a teacher in order to exercise his profession 
intelligently should know something about the chief 
authorities in it. Here, however, I suppose such an as- 
sertion will seem paradoxical; but there is a good deal 
to be said in defense of it. De Quincy has pointed out 
that a man who takes up any pursuit without knowing 
what advances others have made in it, works at a great 
disadvantage. He does not apply his strength in the 
right direction, he troubles himself about small matters 
and neglects great, he falls into errors that have long 
since been exploded. An educator is, I think, liable to 
these dangers if he brings to his task no knowledge but 
that which he learnt for the tripos, and no skill but that 
which he acquired in the cricket-ground or on the river. 
If his pupils are placed entirely in his hands, his work is 



8 PREFACE. 

one of great difficulty, with heavy penalties attached to 
all blundering in it; though here, as in the case of the ig- 
norant doctor and careless architect, the penalties, unfor- 
tunately, are paid by his victims. If (as more commonly 
happens) he has simply to give a class prescribed in* 
struction, his smaller scope of action limits proportion- 
ally the mischief that may ensue; but even then it is 
obviously desirable that his teaching should be as good 
as possible, and he is not likely to employ the best 
methods if he invents as he goes along, or simply falls 
back on his rememberance of how he was taught himself, 
perhaps in very different circumstances. I venture to 
think, therefore, that practical men in education, as in 
most other things, may derive benefit from the knowl- 
edge of what has already been said and done by the 
leading men engaged in it, both past and present. 

All study of this kind, however is very much impeded 
by want of books. " Good books are in German," says 
Profesor Seeley. I have found that on the history of 
Education, not only good books, but all books are in Ger- 
man, or some other foreign language.* 

*WIien the greater part of this volume was already written, Mr. 
Parker published his sketch of the history of Classical Education (Essays 
on a Liberal Education, edited by Farrar). He seems to me to have been 
very successful in bringing out the most important features of his sub- 
ject, but his essay necessarily shows marks of over-compression. Two 
volumes have also lately appeared on Christian Schools and Scholars 
(Longmans, 1867). Here we have a good deal of information which we 
want, and also, as it seems to me, a good deal which we do not want. The 



PREFACE. 9 

I have, therefore, thought it worth while to publish a 
few such imperfect sketches as these, with which the 
reader can hardly be less satisfied than the author. They 
may, however, prove useful till they give place to a bet- 
ter book. 

Several of the following essays are nothing more than 
compilations. Indeed a hostile critic might assert that 
I had used the scissors with the energy of Mr. Timbs 
and without his discretion. The reader, however, will 
probably agree with me that I have done wisely in put- 
ting before him the opinions of great writers in their 
own language. Where I am simply acting as reporter, 
the author's own way of expressing himself is obviously 
the best; and if, following the example of the gypsies 
and Sir Fretful Plagiary, I had disfigured other people's 
offspring to make them pass for my own, success would 
have been fatal to the purpose I have steadily kept in 
view. The sources of original ideas in any subject, as the 
student is well aware, are few,* but for irrigation we re- 
work characteristically opens with a 10th century description of the per- 
sonal appearance of St. Mark when he landed at Alexandria. The author 
treats only of the times which preceded the Council of Trent. A very 
interesting account of early English education has been given by Mr. 
Furnivall, in the 2d and 3d numbers of the Quarterly Journal of Education 
(1867). 

♦Study of the old authors proves that the utterances of some of our most 
conspicuous reform'^rs— of Mr. Lowe and Mr. Farrar, for instance— do not 
give much evidence of originality, as no doubt those gentlemen would 
readily acknowledge. 



10 PREFACE. 

quire troughs as well as water-springs, and these essays 
are intended to serve in the humbler capacity. 

A word about the incomplete haudling of my subjects. 
I have not attempted to treat any subject completely or 
even with anything like completeness. In giving a sketch, 
of the opinions of an author, one of two methods must 
be adopted; we may give an epitome of all that he has 
said, or by confining ourselves to his most valuable and 
characteristic opinions, may gain space to give these 
fully. As I detest epitomes I have adopted the latter 
method exclusively, but I may sometimes have failed in 
selecting an author's most characteristic principles; and 
probably no two readers of a book would entirely agree 
as to what was most valuable in it: so my account must 
remain, after all, but a poor substitute for the author 
himself. 

For the part of a critic I have at least one qualifica- 
tion — practical acquaintance with the subject. As boy 
or master, I have been connected with no less than eleven 
schools, and my perception of the blunders of other 
teachers is derived mainly from the remembrance of my 
own. Some of my mistakes have been brought home ta 
me by reading works on education, even those with 
which I do not in the main agree. Perhaps there are 
teachers who on looking through the follo^ving pages 
may meet with a similar experience. 

Had the essays been written in the order in which they 



PREFACE. 11 

Stand, a good deal of repetition might have been avoided, 
but this repetition has at least the advantage of bringing 
out points which seem to me important; and as no one 
will read the book as carefully as I have done, I hope no 
one will be as conscious of this and other blemishes 
in it. 

I much regret that in a work which is nothing if it is 
not practically useful, I have so often neglected to mark 
the exact place from which quotations are taken. I have 
myself paid the penalty of this carelessness in the trouble 
it has cost rae to verify passages which seemed inac- 
curate. 

The authority I have had recourse to most frequently 
is Raumer (Geschiihte der P(Bdagogik). In his lirst two 
volumes he gives an account of the chief men con- 
nected with education, from Dante to Pestalozzi. The 
third volume contains essays on various parts of educa- 
tion, and the fourth is devoted to German Universities. 
There is an English translation published in America, of 
the fourth volume only. I confess to a great partiality 
for Raumer — a partiality which is not shared by a Sat- 
urday Reviewer and by other competent authorities in 
this country. But surely a German author who is not 
profound, and is almost perspicuous, has some claim on 
the gratitude of English readers, if he gives information 
which we cannot get in our own language. To Raumer 
I am indebted for all that I have written about Ratich,. 



12 PRKFACK. 

and almost all about UasodoNV. Elsewhoro his history 
Ikis boon used, tliough not to the same extent. 

C. A. Schmid's Enci/clopiedie des Er%iehHng8 und Unt&r- 
richhwes&m is a vast mine of information on everything 
connected with education. The work is still in progress. 
The part containg Romseau has only just reached me. 
I should have boon glad of it when I was giving an 
account of tlie Emile, as Raunier was of little use 
to me. 

Those for whom Schmid is too diffuse and expensive 
will tind Carl Gottlob llorgnng's P(edagogtsckfi Reahnci/- 
chpiedie useful. This is in two thick volumes, and costs, 
to the best of my memory, about eighteen shillings. It 
was tinishod in 184V. 

The best sketch I have met with of the general history 
of education is in the article on Pcedagogik in Meyer a Con- 
versatiom-Lexfcoth I wish some one would translate this 
article; and I should be glad to draw the attention of 
the editor of an educational periodical, say the Museum 
or the Quartfr/'i/ Journal of Education^ to it. 

I have come upon referenees to many other works on 
the History of Education, but of these the only ones I 
have seen are Theodore Fritz^s Eaquissse d'un Systeme com- 
plet d'imtrudion et d' education et de Uur histoire (o vols. Stras- 
burg, 184o), and Carl Schmid's Geschichte der Padoyogik 
(4 vols.) The first of these gives only the outline of 



PREFACE. la 

the Kuljject. The Kecorid Ih, I believe, coriHidered a 
Htandard work. It doen not rieeni to me so readable as 
Kaurrier'.s IiiHtory, but is much more complete, and 
comcK down to quite recent timcK.* 

For my account of the Jenuit hcIiooIh and of Penta- 
lozzi, the authorities will be found elsewhere (pp. 19 and 
199). In writing about Comenius I have had much 
assistance from a life of him prefixed to an English 
translation of his School of Infancy^ by Daniel Benham 
(London, 1 808). For almost all the information given 
about Jacotot, I am indebted to Mr. Payne's papers, 
which I should not have ventured to extract from so 
freely if they had }h'A'J\ before the public in a more per- 
manent form.f 

I am sorry I can not refer to any English works on the 
history of Education, except the essays of Mr. Parker 
and Mr. Fumivall, and Christian Schools and Scholars, 
which are mentioned above, but we have a very good 
treatise on the principles of education in Marcel's Lan- 
guage as a Means of Mental Culture (2 vols. I^ondoD, 1853). 
Edgeworth's Practical Education seems falling into unde- 
served neglect, and Mr. Spencer's recent work is not 
universally known even by schoolmasters. 



* (A translation by Prof. W. H. Payne of Compayre's History of Ped- 
agogy has recently been jiubllshed at .^1 .75. Prof. Payne is also author of 
•'A Short History of Education," 50 cts.J 

t [They are now published in his " J.ectures on the Science and Art of 
Education," complete linglish edition, $1.50; Pteading-Club edition, 81.00.] 



14 PREFACE. 

If the following pages attract but few readers it will 
be some consolation, though rather a melancholy one, 
that I share the fate of my betters. 

R. H. Q. 

Ingatestone, Essex, May, 1868. 



CONTENTS. 



I. Schools of the Jesuits 17 

II. Roger Ascham ^ . . 35 

Michael Eygnem Montaigne 42 

III. The Innovators - 45 

Wolfgang Ratich --. .-. 46 

John Milton . 53 

IV. John Amos Comenius 56 

V. John Locke 81 

VI. Jean Jacques Rousseau 108 

VII. John Bernhard Basedow 138 

-^III. John Henry Pestalozzi 156 

Pestalozzianism - - 176 

IX. Joseph Jacotot 196 

X. Herbert Spencer . - 224 

XI. Thoughts and Suggestions 255 

XII. Moral and Religious Education 276 

ippendix. — 

Class Matches 288 

Doctrinale Alexandri de Villa Dei 289 

Lily's Grammar 290 

Colet 292 

Mulcaster 293 

^. Words and Things 396 

Axiomatic Truths of Methodology 301 

From Janua Linguarum 303 

Locke on Poetry 304 

Dr. Wiese on English vs. German Schools -.. 316 



SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 

Since the revival of learning, do body of men has 
played so prominent a part in education as the Jesuits. 
With characteristic sagacity and energy, they soon 
seized on education as a stepping-stone to power and 
influence; and with their talent for organization, they 
Framed a system of schools which drove all important 
competitors from the field, and made the Jesuits the 
instructors of Catholic, and even, to some extent, of 
Protestant, Europe. Their skill in this capacity is 
attested by the highest authorities, by Bacon and by 
Descartes, the latter of whom had himself been their 
pupil; and it naturally met with its reward: for more 
than one hundred years nearly all the foremost men 
throughout Christendom, both among the clergy and 
laity, had received the Jesuit training, and for life 
regarded their old masters with reverence and affection* 

About these Jesuit schools — once so celebrated and 
so powerful, and still existing in great numbers, though 
little remains of their original importance — there does 
not seem to be much information accessible to the Eng- 
lish reader. I have, therefore, collected the following 
particulars about them; and refer any one who is dis- 
satisfied with so meagre an account, to the works which 
I have consulted. The Jesuit schools, as I said, still 



18 SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 

exist, but they did their great work in other centuries; 
and I therefore prefer to speak of them as things of the 
past. 

When the Jesuits were first formally recognized by a 
Bull of Paul III. in 1540, the Bull stated that the Order 
was formed, among other things, "especially for the 
purpose of instructing boys and ignorant persons in the 
Christian religion." But the Society well understood 
that secular was more in demand than religious learn- 
ing; and they offered the more valued instruction that 
they might have the opportunity of inculcating lessons 
which, to the Society at least, were the more valuable. 
From various Popes they obtained powers for founding 
schools and colleges, for giving degrees, and for 
lecturing publicly at universities. Their foundations 
rapidly extended in the Romance countries, except in 
France, where they were long in overcoming the oppo- 
sition of the regular clergy and of the University of 
Paris. Over the Teutonic and Slavonic countries they 
spread their influence first by means of national colleges 
at Rome, where boys of the different nations were 
trained as missionaries. But, in time, the Jesuits pushed 
their camps forward, even into the heart of the enemy's 
country. 

The system of education to be adopted in all the 
Jesuit institutions was settled during the Generalship of 
Aquaviva. In 1584 that General appointed a School 
Commission, consisting of distinguished Jesuits from the 
various countries of Europe. These spent nearly a year 
in Rome, in study and consultation; and the fruit of 
their labors was the Ratio atque Imtitutio Studiorum Socie- 
tatis Jeiu [System and Code of the Studies of the Society 



THEIR CODE OF INSTRUCTION. 19 

of Jesus], wbich was put forth by Aquaviva and the 
Fourth General Assembly. By this Code the Jesuit 
schools have ever since been governed; but about fifty 
years ago it was revised with a view to modern require- 
ments. 

The Jesuits who formed the Societas Professa, i. e., 
those who had taken all the vows, had spent from fifteen 
to eighteen years in preparation, viz., two years as nov- 
ices and one as approved scholars, during which they 
were engaged chiefly in religious exercises, three years 
in the study of philosophy and mathematics, four years 
of theology, and, in case of the more distinguished stu- 
dents, two years more in repetition and private theologi- 
cal study. At some point in this course, mostly after 
the philosophy, the students were sent, for awhile, to 
teach in the elementary schools.* The method of teach- 
ing was to be learnt in the training schools, called 
Juvenants, one of which was founded in each province. 

Few, even of the most distinguished students, 
received dispensation from giving elementary instruc- 
tion. Salraeron and Bobadilla performed this duty in 
Naples, Lainez in Florence, Borgia (who had been 
Viceroy of Catalonia) in Cordova, Canisius in Cologne. 

During the time the Jesuit held his post as teacher he 

♦According to the article in K. A. Schmid's " Encyclopadie," the usual 
course was this— the two years' novitiate was over by the time the youth 
was between fifteen and seventeen. He then entered a Jesuit College as 
Scholasticus. Here he learnt literature and rhetoric for two years, and 
then philosophy (with mathematics) for three more. He then entered on 
his Regency, i. e., he went over the same ground as a teacher, for from 
lour to six years. Then followed a period of theological etudy, ending 
with a year of trial, called the Tertiorat. The candidate was now admitted 
to Priest's Orders, and took the vows either as professor quatuor votorum, 
or as a coadjutor. If he was then sent back to teach, he gave only the 
liigher instruction. 



20 SCHOOLS OP THE JESUITS. 

was to give himself up entirely to the work. His stud- 
ies were abandoned; his religious exercises curtailed. 
He began generally with the lowest form, and went up 
the school with the same pupils, advancing a step every 
year, as in the system now common in Scotland. But 
some forms were always taught, as the highest is in 
Scotland, by the same master, who remained a teacher 
for life. 

Great care was to be taken that the frequent 
changes in the staff of masters did not lead to alter- 
ation in the conduct of the school. Each teacher was 
bound to carry on the established instruction by the 
established methods. All his personal peculiarities and 
opinions were to be as much as possible suppressed. To 
secure this a rigid system of supervision was adopted, 
and reports were furnished by each officer to his immedi- 
ate superior. Over all stood the General of the Order. 
Next came the Provincial, appointed by the General, 
Over the school itself was the Rector, who was appoint- 
ed (for three years) by the General, though he was 
responsible to the Provincial, and made his reports to 
him. Next came the Prefect of Studies, appointed, not 
by the Rector, but by the Provincial. The teachers 
were carefully watched both by the Rector and the Pre- 
fect of Studies, and it was the duty of the latter to 
visit each teacher in his class at least once a fortnight, 
to hear him teach. The other authorities, besides the 
masters of classes, were usually a House Prefect, and 
Monitors selected from the boys, one in each form. 

The school or college was to be built and maintained 
by gifts and bequests which the Society might receive 
for this purpose only. Their instruction was always 



ORGANIZATIO?^^. 21 

given gratuitously. When sufficient funds were raised 
to support the officers, teachers, and at least twelve 
scholars, no effort was to be made to increase them; 
but if they fell short of this, donations were to be 
sought by begging from house to house. Want of 
money, however, was not a difficulty which the Jesuits 
often experienced. 

The pupils in the Jesuit schools were of two kinds: 
1st, those who were training for the Order, and had 
passed the Novitiate; 2d, the externs, who were pupils 
merely. When the building was not filled by the first 
of these (the Scholastia, or JVostri, as they are called in 
the Jesuit writings), other pupils were taken in to board, 
who had to pay simply the cost of their living, and not 
even this unless they could well afford it. Instruction, 
as I said, was gratuitous to all. *' Gratis receive, gratis 
give," was the Society's rule, so they would neither 
make any charge for instruction, nor accept any gift 
that was burdened with conditions. 

Faithful to the tradition of the Catholic Church, the 
Society did not estimate a man's worth simply according 
to his birth and outward circumstances. The Constitu- 
tions expressly laid down that poverty and mean extrac- 
tion were never to be any hindrance to a pupil's admis- 
sion; and Sacchini says: "Do not let any favoring of 
the nobility interfere with the care of meaner pupils, 
since the birth of all is equal in Adam, and the inher- 
itance in Christ." 

The externs who could not be received into the build- 
ing were boarded in licensed houses, which were 
always liable to ?.n unexpected visit from the Prefect of 
Studies. 



22 SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 

The age at which pupils were admitted yaried from 
fourteen to twenty -four. 

The school was arranged in five classes (since in- 
creased to eight), of which the lowest usually had two 
divisions. Parallel classes were formed wherever the: 
number of pupils was too great for five masters. The 
names given to the several divisions were as follows: 

1. Infima [Lowest] ) 

2. Media [Intermediate] } p''*^^'^ Grammaticae, 
„ ^ ■- rxT- 1 T V (jrammatic Class . 

3. Suprema [HighestJ ; ■- -" 

4. Humanitas [Liberal], or Syntaxis [Syntactical]. 

5. Rhetorica [Rhetorical]. 

Jesuits and Protestants alike, in the sixteenth and 
seventeenth centuries thought of no other instruction 
than in Latin and Greek, or rather in literature based on 
those languages. The subject-matter of the teaching in 
the Jesuit schools was to be ^^ prater Grammatwam, quod 
ad Hhetoricam, Polisim et Historiam pertinet " [except gram- 
matical, that which pertains to rhetoric, poetry, and 
history]. Reading and writing the mother tongue might 
not be taught without special leave from the Provincial. 
Latin was as much as possible to supersede all other 
languages, even in speaking; and nothing else might be 
used by the pupils in the higher forms on any day but a 
holiday. 

Although many good school-books were written by 
the Jesuits, a great part of their teaching was given 
orally. The master was, in fact, a lecturer, who 
expounded sometimes a piece of a Latin or Greek 
author, sometimes the rules of grammar. The pupils 
were required to get up the substance of these lectures, 



MODE OF TEACHING. 23 

and to learn the grammar-rules and parts of the clas- 
sical anthors by heart. The master for his part had 
to bestow great pains on the preparation of his lec- 
tures. 

Written exercises, translations, etc., were given on 
every day, except Saturday; and the master had, if 
possible, to go over each one with its writer and his 
appointed rival or cemulus. 

The method of hearing the rules, etc., committed to 
memory was this: Certain boys in each class, who were 
called Decurions, repeated their task to the master, and 
then in his presence heard the other boys repeat 
theirs. The master meanwhile corrected the written 
exercises.* 

One of the leading peculiarities in the Jesuits' system 
was the pains they took to foster emulation — ^^cotem 
ingenii puerilis^ calcar industrm^'''' [the whetstone of 
youthful talent, the spur of industry]. For this purpose, 
all the boys in the lower part of the school were 
arranged in pairs, each pair being rivals {(Bmuli) to one 
another. Every boy was to be constantly on the watch, 
to catch his rival tripping, and was immediately to cor- 
rect him. Besides this individual rivalry, every class 
was divided into two hostile camps, called Rome and 
Carthage, which had frequent pitched battles of ques- 
tions on set subjects. These were the " Concertations," 
in which the boys sometimes had to put questions to 
the opposite camp, sometimes to expose erroneous 

♦ In a school (not belonging to the Jesuits) where this plan was adopted, 
the boys, by an ingenious contrivance, managed to make it work very 
smoothly. The boy who was " hearing " the lesson held the book upside 
down in such a way that the others read instead of repeating by heart. 
The masters finally interfered with this arrangement. 



24 SCHOOLS OF THE TESUITS. 

answers when the questions were asked by the master.* 
Emulation, indeed, was encouraged to a point where, as 
it seems to me, it must have endangered the good feel- 
ing of the boys among themselves. Jouvency mentions 
a practice of appointing mock defenders of any particu- 
larly bad exercise, who should make the author of it 
ridiculous by their excuses; and any boy, whose work 
was very discreditable, was placed on a form by him- 
self, with a daily punishment, until he could show that 
some one deserved to change places with him. 

In the higher classes, a better kind of rivalry was 
cultivated by means of "Academies," i. e., voluntary 
associations for study, which met together, under the 
superintendence of a master, to read themes, transla- 
tions, etc., and to discuss passages from the classics. 
The new members were elected by the old, and to be 
thus elected was a much coveted distinction. In these 
Academies the clever ^tudents got practice for the dis- 
putations, which f or.pild an important part of the school 
work of the higher classes. 

There was a vast number of other expedients by 
which the Jesuits sought to work on their pupils' amotir 
propre [self-respect], such as, on the one hand, the 
weekly publication of offences per prceconem [by the her- 
ald], and, on the other, besides prizes (which could be 
won only by the externs), titles, and badges of honor, 
and the like. It appears that in each class a kind of 
magistracy was formed, who, as praetors, censors, etc., 

* Since the above was written, an account of these concertations has 
appeared in the Rev. R. G. Kingdon's evidence before the Schools Com- 
mission (vol. v., Answers 12,228 fif.). Mr. Kingdon, who is Prefect of 
Studies at Stonyhurst, mentions that the side which wins in most concer- 
tations gets an extra half-holiday. 



THE METHOD IN LATIN. 25 

had in some cases to try delinquents. " There are," 
says Jouvency, " hundreds of expedients of this sort, all 
tending to sharpen the boys' wits, to lighten the labor 
of the master, and to free him from the invidious and 
troublesome necessity of punishing." 

The school-hours were remarkably short: two hours 
and a half in the morning, and the same in the after- 
noon, with a whole holiday a week in summer, and a 
half holiday in winter. The time was spent iu the first 
form after the following manner: During the first half- 
hour, the master corrected the exercises of the previous 
day, while the Decurions heard the lesson which had 
been learnt by heart. Then the master heard the piece 
of Latin which he had explained on the previous day. 
With this construing was connected a great deal of 
parsing, conjugating, declining, etc. The teacher then 
explained the piece for the following day, which, in this 
form, was never to exceed four lines. The last half- 
hour of the morning was spent in explaining grammar. 
This was done very slowly and carefully. In the worils 
of the Ratio Studd.: Plurihus diehus fere singula prcecepta 
inculcanda sunt,^^ [On many days hardly more than a sin- 
gle principle should be taught]. For the first hour of 
the afternoon, the master corrected exercises, and the 
boys learnt grammar. If there was time, the master 
put questions about the grammar he had explained in 
the morning. The second hour was taken up with more 
explanations of grammar, and the school closed with 
half an hour's concertation, or the master corrected the 
notes which the pupils had taken during the day. In 
the other forms, the work was very similar to this, 



26 SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 

except that Greek was added, and also in the higher 
classes a little mathematics. 

It will be observed, from the above account, that 
almost all the strength of the Jesuit teaching was 
thrown into the study of the Latin language, which was 
to be used, not only for reading, but also in writing and 
speaking. But some amount of instruction in other sub- 
jects, especially in history and geography, was given in 
explaining, or rather lecturing on, the classical authors. 
Jouvency says that this lecture must consist of the fol- 
lowing parts: 1st, the general meaning of the whole 
passage; 2d, the explanation of each clause, both as to 
the meaning and construction; 3d, any information^, such 
as accounts of historical events, or of ancient manners 
and customs, which could be connected with the text; 
4th, in the higher forms, applications of the rules of 
rhetoric and poetry; 5th, an examination of the Latinity; 
6th, the inculcation of some moral lesson. This treat- 
ment of a subject he illustrates by examples. Among 
these is an account of a lesson for the first (i. e. lowest) 
class in the Fable of the Fox and the Mask; 1st, comes 
the argument and the explanation of words; 2d, the gram- 
mar and parsing, as vulpes, a substantive of the third 
declension, etc., like proles^ clades, etc. (here the master is 
always to give among his examples some which the 
boys already know) ; 3d, comes the eruditio [information] 
— something about foxes, about tragedy, about the 
brain; and hence about other parts of the head; 4th, the 
Latinity, the order of the words, choice of words, 
synonyms, etc. Then the sentences may be parodied; 
other suitable substantives may be found for the 



LECTURES. 27 

adjectives, and vice versa, and every method is to be 
adopted of showing the boys how to me the words they 
have learnt. Lastly comes the moral. 

The practical teacher will be tempted to ask, How is 
the attention of the class to be kept up whilst all this 
information is given ? This the Jesuits did partly by 
punishing the inattentive. Every boy was subsequently 
required to reproduce what the teacher had said, and to 
show his written notes of it. But no doubt this matter 
of attention was found a difficulty. Jouvency tells the 
teachers to break off from time to time in their lectures, 
and to ask questions; and he adds: " VaricB sunt 
artes excitandce attentionis quas docehit usus et sua cuique indus- 
tria suggeret^'' [There are various expedients for arouv^ing 
the attention that experience will teach and that his 
own diligence will suggest to any one]. 

For private study, besides written exercises and learn- 
ing by heart, the pupils were recommended subjects to 
get up in their own time; and tljis, and also as to the 
length of some of the regular lessons, they were per- 
mitted to decide for themselves. Here, as everywhere^ 
the Jesuits trusted to the sense of honor and emulation 
— those who did extra work were praised and rewarded. 
One of the maxims of this system was: " Repetitio mater 
studiorum^^ [Repetition is the mother of learning"]. 
Every lesson was connected with two repetitions — one 
before it began, of preceding work, and the other at the 
close, of the work just done. Besides this, one day a 
week was devoted entirely to repetition. In the three 
lowest classes the desire of laying a solid foundation 
even led to the second six months in the year being 
given to again going over the work of the first six 



^8 SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 

months. By this means, boys of extraordinary ability 
-could pass through these forms in eighteen months, 
instead of three years. 

Thoroughness in work was the one thing insisted on. 
Sacchini says that much time should be spent in going 
over the more important things, which are ^^velutimul- 
iorumfontes et capita'''' [like the sources and central points 
of many things]; and that the master should prefer to 
teach a few things perfectly to giving indistinct impres- 
sions of many things. We should remember, however, 
that there were usually no pupils in the Jesuit schools 
under fourteen years of age. Subjects such as gram- 
mar can not, by any expenditure of time and trouble, be 
perfectly taught to children, because they can not per- 
fectly understand them; so that the Jesuit thoroughness 
is not always attainable. 

The usual duration of the course in the lower schools 
was six years — i. e., one year in each of the four lower 
<3lasses, and two years in the highest class. Every year 
closed with a very formal examination. Before this 
examination took place, the pupils had lessons in the 
manner of it, so that they might come prepared, not 
only with a knowledge of the subjects, but also of the 
laws of writing for examination (^^ scribendi ad examen 
leges "). The examination was conducted by a commis- 
sion appointed for the purpose, of which commission the 
Prefect of Studies was an ex-officio member. The mas- 
ters of the classes, though they were present and could 
make remarks, were not of the examining body. For the 
viva voce [oral], the boys were ushered in, three at a 
time, before the solemn conclave. The results of the 
examination, both written and verbal, were joined with 



MIND, SOUL, AND BODY. 29 

the records of the work done in the past year; and the 
names of those pupils who had distinguished themselves 
were then published in order of merit, but the poll was 
arranged alphabetically, or according to birthplace. 

As might be expected, the Jesuits were to be very 
careful of the moral and religious training of their pupils. 
" Quam maxime in vita prohitate ac bonis artihus doctrinaque 
proficiant ad Dei gloriam,^^ [That as far as possible, they 
may advance in integrity of character and in right con- 
duct and in learning to the glory of God]. {Ratio Studd.y 
quoted by Schmid.) And Sacchini tells the master to 
remember how honorable his office is; as it has to do, 
not with grammar only, but also with the science and 
practice of a Christian and religious life: '-^ atque eo qui- 
dem ordine ut ipsa ingenii eruditio sit expolitio morum, et humana 
literatura divince ancilletur sapientKB,''^ [and in such a way es- 
pecially that learning itself may lead to refinement of 
manners, and that human scholarship may become the 
handmaid of divine wisdom]. 

Each lesson was to begin with a prayer or sign of the 
cross. The pupils were to hear mass every morning, 
and were to be urged to frequent confession and receiv-^ 
ing of the Holy Communion. 

The bodily health also was to be carefully attended to. 
The pupils were not to study too much or too long at a 
time. Nothing was to be done for a space of from one 
to two hours after dinner. On holidays excursions were 
made to farms in the country. 

Punishments were to be as light as possible, and the 
master was to shut his eyes to offences whenever he 
thought he might do so with safety. Grave offences 
were to be visited by flogging, performed by a " cor- 



so SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 

rector," who was not a member of the Order. Where 
^flogging did not have a good effect, the pupil was to be 
expelled. 

The dry details into which I have been drawn by 
faithfully copying the manner of the Ratio Studiorum 
may seem to the reader to afford no answer to the ques- 
tion which naturally suggests itself — to what did the 
school-systemof the Jesuits owe its enormous popularity? 
But in part, at least, these details do afford an answer. 
They show us that the Jesuits were intensely practical 
They title Ratio Studiorum has been called a misnomer, for 
the book so designated hardly contains a single principle; 
but what it does is this — it points out a perfectly attaina- 
ble goal, and carefully defines the road by which that goal 
is to be approached. For each class was prescribed not 
only the work to be done, but also the end to be kept in 
view. Thus method reigned throughout; — perhaps not 
the best method, as the object to be attained was as- 
suredly not the highest object; but the method, such as 
it was, was applied with undeviating exactness. In this 
particular the Jesuit schools contrasted strongly with 
their rivals of old, as indeed with the ordinary school of 
the present day. The Head Master, who is to the mod- 
ern English school what the General, Provincial, Hector, 
Prefect of Studies, and Ratio Studiorum combined were 
to a school of the Jesuits, has perhaps no standard in 
view up to which the boy should have been brought 
when his school course is completed.* The masters of 
forms teach just those portions of their subjects in which 

* As the recent Commission has pointed out, the Head Master often 
thinks of nothing but the attainment of University honors, even when the 
great majority of his pupils are not going to the University. 



CAUSE OF THEIR SUCCESS. 31 

they themselves are interested, in any way that occurs 
to them, with by no means uniform success; so that 
when two forms are examined with the same examina- 
tion paper, it is no very uncommon occurrence for the 
lower to be found superior to the higher. It is, perhaps, 
to be expected that a course in which uniform method 
tends to a definite goal would on the whole be more 
successful than one in which a boy has to accustom him- 
self by turns to half-a-dozen different methods, invented 
i at haphazard by individual masters with different aims 
i in view, if indeed they have any aim at all, 

I have said that the object which the Jesuits proposed 
in their teaching was not the highest object. They did 
not aim at developing all the faculties of their pupils, 
but merely the receptive and reproductive faculties. 
When the young man had acquired a thorough mastery 
of the Latin language for all purposes, when he was 
well versed in the theological and philosophical opinions 
of his preceptors, when he was skillful in dispute, and 
could make a brilliant display from the resources of a 
well-stored memory, he had reached the highest point 
to which the Jesuit sought to lead him. Originality and 
independence of mind, love of truth for its own sake, the 
power of reflecting, and of forming correct judgments, 
were not merely neglected — they were suppressed in the 
Jesuits' system. But in what they attempted they were 
eminently successful, and their success went a long way 
toward securing their popularity.* 

* Ranke, speaking of the success of the Jesuit schools, says : "It was 
found that young persons learned more under them in half a year than 
with others in two years. Even Protestants called back their children 
from distant schools, and put them under the care of the Jesuits."— JHisf. 
of Popes, book v., p. 138. Kelly's Trans. 



32 SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 

Their popularity was due, moreover, to the means 
employed, as well as to the result attained. The Jesuit 
teachers were to lead, not drive their pupils; to make 
" duciplinam non modo tolerahilem, sed etiam amabilem^'^ 
[discipline not only endurable but even agreeable]. 
Sacchini expresses himself very forcibly on this subject. 
" It is," says he, " the unvarying decision of wise men, 
whether in ancient or modern times, that the instruction 
of youth will always be best when it is ploasantest: 
whence this application of the word Indus, [game]. The 
tenderness of youth requires of us that we should not 
overstrain it, its innocence that we should abstain from 
harshness. . . . That which enters into willing ears 
the mind as it were runs to welcome, seizes with avidity, 
carefully stows away and faithfully preserves." The 
pupils were therefore to be encouraged in every way to 
take kindly to their learning. With this end in view 
(and no doubt other objects, also), the masters were 
carefully to seek the boys' affections. " When pupils 
Jove the master," says Sacchini, " they will soon love 
his teaching. Let him, therefore, show an interest in 
everything that concerns them and not merely in their 
studies. Let him rejoice with those that rejoice, and 
not disdain to weep with those that weep. After the 
example of the apostle let him become a little one 
amongst little ones, that he may make them adult in 
Christ, and Christ adult in them. . . Let him unite 
the grave kindness and authority of a father with a 
mother's tenderness." * 

* Unfortunately, the Jesuit's kind manner loses its value from being du« 
not so much to kind feeling as to some ulterior object, or to a rule of the 
Order. I think it is Jouvency who recommends that when a boy is absent 



LEARNING MADE ATTRACTIVE. 33 

In order that learning might be pleasant to the pupils, 
it was necessary that they should not be overtasked. To 
avoid this the master had to study the character and 
capacity of each boy in his class, and to keep a book with 
all particulars about him, and marks from one to six in- 
dicating proiiciency. Thus the master formed an esti- 
mate of what should be required, and the amount varied 
considerably with the pupil, though the quality of the 
work was always to be good. 

Not only was the work not to be excessive, it was 
never to be of great difficulty. Even the grammar was 
to be made as easy and attractive as possible. " I think 
it a mistake," says Sacchini, *' to introduce at an early 
stage the more thorny difficulties of grammar: . . . 
for when the pupils have become familiar with the easier 
parts, use will, by degrees, make the more difficult clear 
to them. His mind expanding and his judgment ripen- 
ing as he grows older, the pupil will often see for him- 
self that which he could be hardly made to see by oth- 
ers. Moreover, in reading an author, examples of 
grammatical difficulties will be more easily observed in 
connection with the context, and will make more im- 
pression on the mind, than if they are taught in an 
abstract form by themselves. Let them, then, be care- 
fully explained whenever they occur." 

In collecting these particulars about the Jesuit 
schools, I have considered not how this or that might be 
used in attacking or defending the Order, but, simply, 

from sickness or other sufficient reason, ttie master should send dally to 
inquire after him, because the parents will be pleased by such attention. 
When the motive of the inquiry is suspected, the parents will be pleaded 
no longer. 

B 



34 SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 

what would be of most interest to those who are 
engaged in education. 

No other school system has been built up by the 
united efforts of so many astute intellects; no other 
system has met with so great success, or attained such 
wide-spread influence. It deserves, therefore, our care- 
ful consideration; and, however little we may approve 
that system, and wish to imitate it as a whole, it may 
suggest to us not a few useful reflections on our own 
practice; may lead us to be clearer in our aims; and to 
value more highly a well-organized plan of instruction — 
without which even humble aims will mostly prove un- 
attainable. 



II. 

ASCHAM AND MONTAIGNE. 

Masters and scholars who sigh over what seera to 
them the intricacies and obscurities of the "Head-mas- 
ters' Primer" may find some consolation in thinking 
that, after all, matters might have been worse, and that 
their fate is enviable indeed compared with that of the 
students of Latin 400 years ago. Did the reader ever 
open the ^'Bootrinale " of Alexander de Villa Dei, which 
was the grammar in general use from the middle of the 
thirteenth to the end of the fifteenth century ? If so, 
he is aware how great a step toward simplicity was 
made by our grammatical reformers, Lily, Colet, and 
Erasmus. Indeed, those whom we now regard as the 
forgers of our chains were, in their own opinion and 
that of their contemporaries, the champions of freedom. 

I have given elsewhere a remarkable passage from 
Colet, in which he recommends the leaving of rules and 
the study of examples in good Latin authors. Wolsey 
also, in his directions to the masters of Ipswich School 
(dated 1528), proposes that the boys should be exercised 
in the eight parts of speech in the first form, and should 
begin to speak Latin and translate from English into 
Latin in the second. If the masters think fit, they may 
also let the pupils read Lily's ^^ Carmen Monitorum,^^ or 
Oato's ^^BisttchsV From the third upward a regular 



36 ROGER ASCHAM. 

course of classical authors was to be read, and Lily's 
rules were to be introduced by degrees. "Although I 
confess such things are necessary," writes Wolsey, " yet, 
as far as possible, we could wish them so appointed as 
not to occupy the more valuable part of the day." Only 
in the sixtii form, the highest but two, Lily's syntax was 
to be begun. In these schools the boys' time was 
wholly taken up with Latin, and the speaking of Latin 
was enforced even in play hours, so we see that anom^ 
alies in the Accidence as taught in the As in pratenti 
were not given till the boys had been some time using 
the language; and the syntax was kept until they had 
a good practical knowledge of the usages to which the 
rules referred. 

These great men, however, though they showed the 
interest they took in the instruction of the young, and 
the insight they had into the art of teaching, never at- 
tempted a perfect treatise on the subject. This was 
done some fifty years afterward by the celebrated 
Roger Ascham in his "Scholemaster." If hudari a lau- 
datus [praise from the praised] is any test of merit, we 
may assume that this book is still deserving of atten- 
tion. " It contains, perhaps," says Dr. Johnson, *' the 
best advice that was ever given for the study of lan- 
guages."* And Mr. J. E. B. Mayor (no mean author- 
ity) ventures on a still stronger assertion. ^* This book 
sets forth," says he, the only sound method of acquiring a 
dead language^ Mr. George Long has also borne witness 
on the same side. 

And yet, I believe, few teachers of the dead lan- 
guages have read Ascham's book, or know the method 

*IAfe of Ascham. 



I 



HIS LATIN METHOD. 37 

he proposes. 1 will, therefore, give an account of it, as 
nearly as I can in Ascbam's own words. 

Latin is to be taught as follows: First, let the cbild 
learn the eight parts of speech, and then the right join- 
ing together of substantives with adjectives, the noun 
with the verb, the relative with the antecedent. After 
the concords are learned, let the master take Sturm's 
selection of Cicero's Epistles, and read them after this 
manner: "first, let him teach the child, cheerfully and 
plainly, the cause and matter of the letter; then, let 
him construe it into English so oft as the child may 
easily carry away the understanding of it; lastly, parse 
it over perfectly. This done, then let the child by and 
by both construe and parse it over again ; so that it 
may appear that the child doubteth in nothing that his 
master has taught him before. After this, the child 
must take a paper book, and, sitting in some place 
where no man shall prompt him, by himself let him 
translate into English his former lesson. Then showing 
it to his master, let the master take from him his Latin 
book, and pausing an hour at the least, then let the 
child translate his own English into Latin again in an- 
other paper book. When the child biingeth it turned 
into Latin, the master must compare it with Tully's 
book, and lay them both together, and where the child 
doth well, praise him, where amiss point out why Tully's 
use is better. Thus the child will easily acquire a 
knowledge of grammar, and also the ground of almost 
all the rules that are so busily taught by the master, 
and so hardly learned by the scholar in all common 
schools." " We do not contemn rules, but we gladly 
teach rules; and teach them more plainly, sensibly, and 



38 ROGER ASCHAM. 

orderly, than they be commonly taught in common 
schools. For when the master shall compare Tully'& 
book with the scholar's translation, let the master at the 
first lead and teach the scholar to join the rules of hm 
grammar book with the examples of his present lesson^ 
until the scholar by himself be able to fetch out of his 
grammar every rale for every example; and let the 
grammar book be ever in the scholar's hand, and also 
used by him as a dictionary for every present use. 
This is a lively and perfect way of teaching of rules;, 
where the common way used in common schools to read 
the grammar alone by itself is tedious for the master, 
hard for the scholar, cold and uncomfortable for them 
both." And elsewhere Ascham says: " Yea I do wish 
that all rules for young scholars were shorter than they 
be. For, without doubt, grammatica itself is sooner and 
surer learned by examples of good authors than by the 
naked rules of grammarians." 

"As you perceive your scholar to go better on away, 
first, with understanding his lesson more quickly, with 
parsing more readily, with translating more speedily 
and perfectly than he was wont; after, give him longer 
lessons to translate, and, withal, begin to teach him, 
both in nouns and verbs, what is proprium [the individ- 
ual meaning of the word] and what is translatum [its 
meaning in a particular passage], what synonymum [the 
shades of difference between it and similar words], what 
diversum [other words of like meaning], which be con- 
traria [other words of opposite meaning], and which be 
most notable phrases, in all his lectures, as — 

Proprium . . Rex sepultus est magnifice. [The king is 
buried magnificeDtly.] 



HIS LATIN METHOD. 39 

Translatum . . Cum illo principe, sepulta est et gloria et 
salus reipublicse. [With that chief is 
buried the glory and the safety of the re- 
public.] 

Synonyma . . Ensis, gladius, laudare, praedicare. 

Diversa . . . Diligere. amare, colere, exardescere, inimi- 
cus, hostis. 

Contraria . . Acerbum et luctuosum bellum, dulcis et 
laeta pax. [War is bitter and sorrowful, 
peace is sweet and joyful.] 

Phrases . , . Dare verba, abjicere obedientiam." [To 
deceive, to revolt.] 

Every lesson is to be thus carefully analyzed, and 
entered under these headings in a third MS. book. 

All this time, though the boy is to work over some 
Terence, he is to speak no Latin. Subsequently the 
master must translate easy pieces from Cicero into 
English, and the boy, without having seen the original 
passage, is required to put the English into Latin. His 
translation must then be carefully compared with the 
original, for " of good heed-taking springeth chiefly 
knowledge." 

In the Second Book of the " Scholemaster," Ascham 
discusses the various branches of the study then com- 
mon, viz: 1. Translatio linguarum [Translation of lan- 
guages]; 2. Paraphrasis [Paraphrase]; 3. Metaphrasis 
[Metaphrase]; 4. Epitome; 5. Imitatio [Imitation]; 
6. Declamatio [Declamation]. He does not lay much 
stress on any of these, except translatio and imitatio. Of 
the last he says: "All languages, both learned and 
mother-tongue, be gotten, and gotten only by imitation. 
For, as ye use to hear, so ye use to speak; if ye hear no 
other, ye speak not yourself; and whom ye only hear, 



40 ROGEE ASCHA.M. 

of them ye only learn." But translation was his great 
instrument for all kinds of learning. " The translation," 
he says, " is the most common and most commendable 
of all other exercises for youth; most common, for all 
your constructions in grammar schools be nothing else 
but translations, but because they be not douUe transla- 
tions (as I do require) they bring forth but simple and 
single commodity: and because also they lack the daily 
use of writing, which is the only thing that breedeth 
deep root, both in the wit for good understanding and 
in the memory for sure keeping of all that is learned; 
most commendable also, and that by the judgment of 
all authors which entreat of these exercises." 

After quoting Pliny, he says: "You perceive how 
Pliny teacheth that by this exercise of double translat- 
ing is learned easily, sensibly, by little and little, not 
only all the hard congruities of grammar, the choice of 
ablest words, the right pronouncing of words and sen- 
tences, comeliness of figures, and forms fit for every 
matter and proper for every tongue: but, that which is 
greater also, in marking daily and following diligently 
thus the footsteps of the best authors, like invention of 
arguments, like order in disposition, like utterance in 
elocution, is easily gathered up; and hereby your 
scholar shall be brought not only to like eloquence, but 
also to all true understanding and rightful judgment, 
both for writing and speaking." 

Again he says: "For speedy attaining, I durst ven- 
ture a good wager if a scholar in whom is aptness, love, 
diligence, and constancy, would but translate after this 
sort some little book in Tully (as ^De 8emdute^ with 
two epistles, the first ^Ad Quintum Fratrem^ the other 



DOUBLE TKANSLA.TION. 41 

^Ad Lentulum^), that scholar, I say, should come to a 
better knowledge in the Latin tongue than the most 
part do that spend from five to six years in tossing all 
the rules of grammar in common schools." After 
quoting the instance of Dion Prussaeus, who came to 
great learning and utterance by reading and following 
only two books, the " Ph(Bdo " and " Demosthenes de Falsa 
Legatione^^ he goes on: "And a better and nearer exam- 
ple herein may be our most noble Queen Elizabeth, who 
never took yet Greek or Latin grammar in her hand 
after the first declining of a noun and a verb; but only 
by this double translating of Demosthenes and Isocrates 
daily, without missing, every forenoon, and likewise 
some part of Tully every afternoon, for the space of a 
year or two, hath attained to such a perfect understand- 
ing in both the tongues, and to such a ready utterance 
of the Latin, and that with such a judgment, as there 
be few now in both Universities or elsewhere in England 
that be in both tongues comparable with Her Majesty.'' 
Ascham's authority is indeed not conclusive on this 
point, as he, in praising the Queen's attainments, was 
vaunting his own success as a teacher; and, moreover, 
if he flattered her he could plead prevailing custom. 
But we have, I believe, abundant evidence that Eliza- 
beth was an accomplished scholar. 

Before I leave Ascham, I must make one more quota- 
tion, to which I shall more than once have occasion 
to refer. Speaking of the plan of double translation, he 
fiays: " Ere the scholar have construed, parsed, twice 
translated over by good advisement, marked out his six 
points by skillful judgment, he shall have necessary 
occasion to read over every lecture a doten times at the 



42 MICHEL EYQUEM MONTAIGNE. 

least; which because he shall do always in order, he 
shall do it always with pleasure. . . . And pleasure 
allureth love; love hath lust to labor; labor always 
obtaineth his purpose." 



MONTAIGNE. 



Montaigne was a contemporary of Ascham, but about 
thirty years younger. In his essays he may be said to 
have founded a school of thinkers on the subject of edu- 
cation, of which Locke and Rousseau were afterward the 
great exponents. As far as regards method of teaching 
languages, he simply discarded grammatical teaching, 
and wished that all could be taught Latin as he had 
been, i. e., by conversation. His father had found a 
German tutor for him, who spoke Latin, but not 
French; and the child thus grew up to consider Latin 
his mother-tongue. At six years old he knew no more 
French, he tells us, than Arabic. 

As I intend giving an account of Montaigne's princi- 
ples in the form in which they were presented by Locke 
and Rousseau, I need not state them fully in this place; 
but a quotation or two will show how much his succes- 
sors were indebted to him. He complains of common 
education as being too much taken up with language* 
" Fine speaking," says he, " is a very good and com- 
mendable quality, but not so excellent or so necessary 
as some would make it; and I am scandalized that our 
whole life should be spent in nothing else. I would 



i 



PEOTEST AGAINST THE CLASSICS. 43- 



first understand my own language, and that of my neigh- 
bor, with whom most of my business and conversation, 
lies. No doubt Greek and Latin are very great orna- 
ments, and of very great use; but we may buy them too 
dear." From our constant study of words the world is 
nothing but babble; and yet of the truly educated we 
must say with Cicero, " JSanc amplissimam omnium artium 
"bene vivendi disciplinam^ vita magis quam Uteris per secuti sunt^^'' 
[They have cultivated this broadest of all arts, the les- 
son of right living, in life rather than in literature]. He 
would take for his models not the Athenians, but the 
Spartans. *' Those cudgelled their brains about words, 
these made it their business to inquire into things; there 
was an eternal babble of the tongue, here a continual 
exercise of the soul. And therefore it is nothing strange 
if, when Antipater demanded ,of them fifty children for 
hostages, they made answer that they would rather 
give him twice as many full grown men, so much did 
they value the loss of their country's education." 

Ordinary teaching, again, gives only the thoughts of 
others, without requiring the pupil to think for himself., 
*' We suffer ourselves to lean and rely so very strongly 
upon the arm of another, that by doing so we prejudice 
our own strength and vigor. ... I have no taste 
for this relative, mendicant, and precarious understand- 
ing; for though we should become learned by other 
men's reading, I am sure a man can never be wise but 
by his own wisdom." As it is, "we only toil and 
labor to stuff the memory, and in the meantime leave 
the conscience and the understanding unfurnished and 
void. And, like birds who fly abroad to forage for 
grain bring it home in their beak without tasting it them- 



44 MICHEL EYQUEM MONTAIGNE. 

selves, to feed their young, so our pedants go picking 
knowledge here and there out of several authors, and 
hold it at their tongue's end only to spit it out and dis- 
tribute it amongst their pupils." The dancing-master 
might as well attempt to teach us to cu^ capers by our 
listening to his instructions without moving from our 
seats, as the tutor to inform our understandings without 
setting them to work. "Yet 'tis the custom of school- 
masters to be eternally thundering in their pupil's ears, 
as they were pouring into a funnel, whilst the pupil's 
business is only to repeat what the others said before. 
Now I would have a tutor to correct this error, and that 
at the very first: he should, according to the capacity he 
has to deal with, put it to the test, permitting his pupil 
himself to taste and relish things, and of himself to 
-choose and discern them, sometimes opening the way 
to him, and sometimes making him break the ice 
himself; that is, I would not have the governor 
alone to invent and speak, but that he should also hear 
his pupils speak. Socrates, and since him Arcesilaus, 
first made their scholars speak, and then spoke to them. 
Ohest plerumque lis qui discere volant audoritas eorum qui docenfj 
[It is especially harmful to those who wish to learn to 
be under the authority of those that teach]. 

He also insisted on the importance of physical educa- 
tion. " We have not to train up a soul, nor yet a body, 
•but a man; and we cannot divide him." 



III. 

THE INNOVATORS. 

The Papal system was conrected, in the minds of the 
Reformers, with scholastic subtilties, monkish Latin, 
and ignorance of Greek; the Reformation itself, with 
the revival of classical learning. Their opponents, the 
Jesuits, also fostered Latin as the language of the 
Church, and taugl t Greek as necessary for controversy. 
So, for a time, the effect of the Reformation was to 
confine instruction more exclusively to the classical 
languages. The old Trkium (grammar, logic, and 
rhetoric), and Quadrimum (arithmetic, geometry, music, 
and astronomy), had recognized, at least in name, a 
course of instruction in what was then the encyclopaedia 
of knowledge. But now all the great school -masters — 
Ascham in England, Sturm in Germany, the Jesuits 
everywhere — thought of nothing but Latin and Greek. 
Before long, other voices besides Montaigne's were 
heard objecting to this bondage to foreign languages, 
and demanding more attention for the mother tongue 
and for the study of ihmgs.^ This demand has been kept 
up by a series of reformers, with whom the classicists,, 
after withstanding a siege of nearly three centuries,, 
seem at length inclined to come to terms. 

The chief demands of these reformers, or Innovators, 
as Raumer calls them, have been, 1st, that the study of 
fhinga should precede, or be united with, the study of 

* Mulcaster shows In his EUmentnrie, how soon the advantage of study- 
ing the mother-tongue and rejecting the dominion of Latin was advocated 
In this country. 



46 WOLFGANG RATICH. 

words; 2d, that knowledge should be communicated, 
where possible, by appeals to the senses; 3d, that all' 
linguistic study should begin with that of the mother- 
tongue; 4th, that Latin and Greek should be taught to 
such boys only as would be likely to complete a learned 
education; 5th, that physical education should be 
attended to in all classes of society for the sake of 
health, not simply with a view to gentlemanly accom- 
plishments; 6th, that a new method of teaching should 
be adopted, framed " according to nature." 

Their notions of method have, of course, been very 
various; but their systems mostly agree in these partic- 
ulars. 

1. They proceed from the concrete to the abstract, 
giving some knowledge of the thing itself before the 
rules which refer to it. 2. They employ the student in 
analyzing matter put before him, rather than in working 
synthetically according to precept. 3. They require the 
student to teach himself ^ under the superintendence of the 
master, rather than be taught by the master and receive 
anything on the master's authority. 4. They rely on 
-the interest excited in the pupil by the acquisition of 
knowledge, and renounce coercion. 5. Only that which 
is understood may be committed to memory. 1 



RATICH. 



During the early years of the seventeenth century, 
there was a man traveling over Europe, to offer to 
Princes and Universities a wonderful discovery whereby 



A SANGUINE REFORMER. 47 

old or young might with ease, in a very short time, 
learn Hebrew, Greek, Latin, or any other tongue. This, 
however, was but a small part of what the discoverer 
promised. He would also found a school, in which all 
arts and sciences should be rapidly learnt and advanced; 
he would introduce, and peacefully maintain through- 
out the continent, a uniform speech, a uniform govern- 
ment, and, more wonderful still, a uniform religion. 
From these modest proposals, we should naturally infer 
that the promiser was nothing but a quack of more than 
usual impudence; but the position which the name of 
Ratich holds in the history of education is sufficient 
proof that this is by no means a complete account of the 
matter. 

Ratich was born at Wilster, in Holstein, in 1571. He 
was educated in the Hamburg Gymnasium, studied 
theology at Rostock, and being prevented, by some de- 
fect of utterance, from taking Holy Orders, he traveled, 
first to England, and then to Amsterdam, where he 
elaborated his system, and offered his secret to Prince 
Maurice of Orange. The Prince wished to stipulate 
that he should confine himself to teaching Latin; but 
Ratich was far too much impressed with the importance 
of his scheme to agree to this. So he went about from 
Court to Court, from University to University, to find 
some ruler or learned body who would agree to his 
terms. In 1612 he memorialized the Electoral Diet, then 
sitting at Frankfort; and his memorial attracted so much 
notice, that several Princes appointed learned men to 
inquire into his system. Helvicus, one of the most cel- 
ebrated of these, published a Report, in which he de- 
clared strongly in favor of Ratich. " We are," says he, 



48 WOLFGANG RATICH. 

" in bondage to Latin. The Greeks and Saracens would 
never have done so much for posterity, if they had 
spent their youth in acquiring a foreign tongue. We 
must study our own language and then sciences. Ratich 
has discovered the art of teaching according to nature. 
By his method, languages will be quickly learned, so 
that we shall have time for science; and science will be 
learned even better still, as the natural system suits best 
with science, which is the study of nature." 

Influenced by this Report, the town of Augsburg in 
1614 summoned Ratich to reform their schools. Here 
the innovator found, to his cost, that he who leaves the 
high road has rough ground to travel over, and all kinds 
of obstacles to surmount. Even his best friends, among 
them Helvicus, were forced toj admit Jthat they were 
disappointed with the result of the experiment. They 
did not desert him, however, and, in 1619, Prince Lewis 
of Anhalt-Kothen, with Prince Ernest of Weimar, 
resolved that the great discovery should not be lost to 
the world for want of a fair trial: so Ratich was estab- 
lished at Kothen, and all his demands were complied 
with. A printing-press was set up for him, with East- 
ern as well as European types. A body of teachers 
(bound over to secrecy) came to receive his instructions, 
and then carried them out, under his directions, in a 
school of 230 boys and 200 girls, which the Prince got 
together for him. But everything was soon in disorder. 
Instead of introducing the uniform religion, he offended 
the Calvanistic Kotheners by his uncompromising 
Lutheranism. And his success was by no means such as 
to defy hostile criticism. His enemies soon declared the 
whole scheme a failure, and naturally went on to de- 



HIS MAXIMS. 49 

nounce its author as an impostor. The prince, exasper- 
ated by the utter break-down of his expectations, 
revenged himself on Ratich by throwing him into 
prison, and after a confinement of some months dis- 
missed him with a public declaration that he had prom- 
ised what he was unable to perform. 

For more than twenty years after this, Ratich con- 
tinued to trumpet his system; but in the din of the 
Thirty Years' War he did not receive much attention. 
He died in 1635. 

Although Ratich's pretensions were manifestly ab- 
surd, and his binding over his pupils to secrecy makes 
us suspect him of being a charlatan, he really seems to 
have been the first to propound many of those principles 
which I have mentioned as the common property of the 
Innovators. Although he professed to teach a foreign 
language in six months, he gave extreme prominence to 
the study of the mother-tongue. The children at Kothen 
had to go through three classes before they began any other 
language. His maxims are these: 1. "Everything after 
the order and course of Nature." 2. " One thing at a 
time." 3. '^One thing again and again repeated." 4. 
" Nothing shall be learnt by heart." In learning by 
by heart, he says, the attention is fixed on the words, 
not on the ideas; but if a thing is thoroughly grasped 
by the understanding, the memory retains it without 
further trouble. 5. " Uniformity in all things." Every- 
thing was to be taught in the same way. Grammars 
of different languages were to be constructed on the same 
plan, and were to differ only in those parts where the 
idioms of the languages differed. 6. " Knowledge of 
the thing itself must be given before that which refers 
c 



50 WOLFGANG RATICH. 

to the thing." ^^Aceidens rei priusquam retn ipsam qu<Brere 
prorsus ahsonum et ahsurdum esse videtur. . . . Ne modus 
rei ante rem,^^ [To search into the attributes of a thing 
before the thing itself seems utterly incongruous and 
absurd. . . . Let not the manner of a thing take 
precedence of the thing itself]. You do not give the 
properties of the square or circle before the pupil knows 
what square and circle are, says Ratich; why then, 
should you give rules about patronymics, e. g., before the 
pupil knows anything of patronymics, or, indeed, of the 
simple facts of the language? The use of rules is to con- 
firm previous knowledge, and not to give knowledge. 7. 
"Everything by experinaent and analysis." Per inductionem 
et experimentum omnia. Nothing was to be received on 
authority. Indeed, Ratich even adopted the motto 
" Vetustas cessit, ratio vicit " [Antiquity has yielded, reason 
has conquered], as if the opposite to ratio was vetustas. 
8. "Everything without coercion." The human under- 
standing, he says, is so formed that it best retains what 
it finds pleasure in receiving.* The rod should be used 
to correct offences against morals only. Ratich laid 
great stress on the maintenance of a good feeling be- 
tween the teacher and the taught, and, lest this should 
be endangered by necessarj'^ discipline, he would hand 
over the care of discipline to a separate officer, called 
the Scholarch. 

When we examine Ratich's method of teaching, we 
shall find that here, too, he deserves to be considered 
the Coryphseus of the Innovators. The teacher of the 

* The reader will find that the unanimity of the writers on education 
In advocating this principle is almost as great as that of the schoolmasters 
in neglecting it. 



HIS METHODS. 51 

lowest class at Kothen had to talk with the children, 
and to take pains with their pronunciation. When they 
knew their letters, the teacher read the book of Genesis 
through to them, each chapter twice over, requiring the 
children to follow with eye and finger. Then the 
teacher began the chapter again, and read about four 
lines only, which the children read after him. When 
the book had been worked over in this way, the children 
were required to read it through without assistance. 
Reading once secured, the teacher proceeded to gram- 
mar. He explained, say, what a substantive was, and 
then showed instances in Genesis, and next required the 
children to point out others. In this way grammar was 
verified throughout from Genesis, and the pupils were 
exercised in declining and conjugating words taken from 
the book. 

When they advanced to the study of Latin, they were 
given a translation of a play of Terence, and worked over 
it several times before they were shown the Latin. The 
master then translated the play to them, each half- 
hour's work twice over. At the next reading, the master 
translated the first half hour, and the boys translated the 
same piece the second. Having thus got through the play, 
they began again, and only the boys translated. After 
thjs there was a course of grammar, which was applied 
to the Terence, as the grammar of the mother-tongue 
had been to Genesis. Finally, the pupils were put 
through a course of exercises, in which they had to turn 
into Latin sentences imitated from the Terence, and 
differing from the original only in the number or per- 
son used, 

Raumer gives other particulars, and quotes largely 



62 WOLFGANG RATICH. 

from the almost unreadable account of Kromayer, one 
of Ratich's followers, in order that we may have, as he 
says, a notion of the tediousness of the method. No 
doubt any one who has followed me hitherto, will con- 
sider that this point has been brought out already with 
sufficient distinctness. 

When we compare Ratich's method with that of 
Ascham, we find that they have much in common. Rat- 
ich began the study of a language with one book, which 
he worked over with the pupil a great many times. 
Ascham did the same. Each lecture, he says, would^ 
according to his plan, be gone over a dozen times at 
the least. Both construed to the pupil, instead of re- 
quiring him to make out the sense for himself. Both 
taught grammar, not independently, but in connection 
with the model book. So far as the two methods differed, 
I have no hesitation in pronouncing Ascham's the better. 
It gave the pupil more to do, and contained the very 
important element, uriting. By this means there was a 
chance of the interest of the pupil surviving the constant 
repetition; but Ratich's pupils must have been bored to 
death. His plan of making them familiar with the trans- 
lation first, was subsequently advocated by Comenius, 
and may have advantages, but in effect the pupil would 
be tired of the play before he began to translate it» 
Then Ratich's plan of going through and through seems 
very inferior to that of thoroughly mastering one lesson 
before going on to the next. I should say that whatever 
merit there was in Ratich's plan, lay in its insisting on 
complete knowledge of a single book, and that this 
knowledge would be much better attained by Ascham's 
practice of double translation. 



THE INNOVATORS. 53 



JOHN MILTON. 

Iq the middle of the seventeenth century there was 
in England a schoolmaster, and author of a Latin ** Ac- 
cidence," who was perhaps the most notable man who 
€ver kept a school or published a school-book. This was 
John Milton. His notions of education have been briefly 
recorded by him in his Tract to Hartlib,* and have been 
read by many of us, not, 1 fancy, without a feeling of 
disappointment. His proposals, indeed, like everything 
connected with him, are of heroic mould. The reader 
{especially if he is a schoolmaster) gasps for breath at 
the mere enumeration of the subjects to be learned and 
the books to be read. In natural philosophy "they (the 
scholars) may proceed leisurely from the history of mete- 
ors, minerals, plants, and living creatures, as far as anat- 
omy." In law, " they are to dive* into the grounds of law 
and legal justice, delivered first, and with best warrant, 
by Moses, and, as far as human prudence can be trusted, 
in those extolled remains of Grecian lawgivers, Lycur- 
gus, Solon, Zaleucus, Charondas, and thence to all the 
Roman edicts and tables with their Justinian, and so 
down to Saxon and common laws of England and the 

* [Reprinted in this country as No. 7 of the School-Room Classics, 
price 15 cts. Not all authorities agree with this estimate of Milton's 
♦'Tractate." Oscar Browning in the article on Education in the Encycloce- 
dia Britannica says : " For more important in the literature of this sub- 
ject than the treatise of Locke is the Tractate on Edxwation by Milton. . . 
The important truth enunciated is quite in the spirit of Comenius that tlie 
learning of things and words are to go hand in hand. . . . The whole 
treatise is full of wisdom, and should be studied again and again. "J 



54 JOHN MILTON. 

Statutes." " To set them right and firm in the knowl- 
edge of virtue and hatred of vice, their young and pli- 
ant affections are to be led through all the moral works 
of Plato, Xenophon, Cicero, Plutarch, and those Locrian 
remnants." " At some set hour they are to learn He- 
brew," with the Chaldee and Syrian dialects, and ''they 
may have easily learned at any odd hour the Italian 
tongue!" "This," says Milton (and here at least he 
carries the reader with him), " is not a bow for every 
man to shoot in, that calls himself a teacher." 

But though Milton flew so high, we shall find, if we 
examine his proposals, that he took the same direction 
as the other Innovators. (1) He denounced, as they 
did, " the asinine feast of sow-thislles and brambles, to 
which we now haul and drag our choicest and hope^ 
fullest wits, as all the food and entertainment of their 
tenderest and most docilable age." In the schools he 
complains that nothing but grammar was taught, at the 
universities nothing but logic and metaphysics. He 
would turn from these verbal toils to the study of 
things. Language was not to be studied for itself, but 
merely as an instrument conveying to us things useful 
to be known. Latin and Greek must therefore be 
acquired by a method that will take little time. This 
method he does not describe at length, but his words 
seem to refer to some such plan as that of Ascham or 
Ratich. " Whereas," he says, ** if after some preparatory 
grounds of speech by their certain forms got into mem- 
ory, they were led to the praxis thereof in some chosen 
short look lessoned thoroughly to them, they might then, 
forthwith proceed to learn the substance of good things 
and arts in due order, which would bring the whole Ian- 



HIS PKOPOSALS. 66 

guage quickly into their power." (2) The young were 
to be led on "by the infinite desire of a happy nurture; 
for the hill of knowledge, laborious indeed at the first 
ascent, else is so smooth, so green, so full of goodly 
prospect and melodious sounds on every side, that the 
harp of Orpheus was not more charming." "Arithmetic 
and the elements of geometry might be learnt even 
playing, as the old manner was." (3) So averse was 
Milton to a merely bookish training, that he would pro- 
cure for his pupils " the helpful experience of hunters, 
fowlers, fishermen, shepherds, gardeners, and apotheca- 
ries; and in other sciences, architects, engineers marin- 
ers and anatomists." The boys were both to hear and 
be taught music — a commencement of aesthetic culture. 
(4) A thorough physical training was to be provided by 
warlike exercises, both on horse and foot, and by wrest- 
ling, "wherein Englishmen are wont to excel."* 

We see, then, that the great authority of Milton may 
be claimed by the Innovators, and a protest against a 
purely literary education comes with tremendous force 
from the student who sacrificed his sight to his reading, 
the accomplished scholar whose Latin works were 
known throughout Europe, and the author of " Paradise 
Lost." 

* I have been assisted here by Professor Seeley's remarks in his arti- 
cle on Milton's political opinions, Macmillan's Magazine, February, 1868. 



IV. 
JOHN AMOS COMENIIJS. 

John Amos Comenius, the son of a miller, who be- 
longed to the Moravian Brethren, was born at the 
Moravian village of Corana, in 1592. Of his early life 
we know nothing but what he himself tells us in the fol- 
lowing passage: "Losing both my parents while I was 
yet a child, I began, through the neglect of my guardi- 
ans, but at sixteen years of age, to taste of the Latin 
tongue. Yet, by the goodness of God, that taste bred 
such a thirst in me that I ceased not from that time by 
all means and endeavors, to labor for the repairing of my 
lost years; and now not only for myself, but for the 
good of others- also. For I could not but pity others 
also in this respect, especially in my own nation, which 
is too slothful and careless in matter of learning. There- 
upon, I was continually full of thoughts for the linding 
out of some means whereby more might be inflamed with 
the love of learning, and whereby learning itself might be 
made more compendious, both in matter of the charge 
and cost, and of the labor belonging thereto, that so the 
youth might be brought by a more easy method unto 
some notable proficiency in learning."* With these 
thoughts in head, he pursued his studies in several Ger- 

* Preface to the Prodromu8. 



HIS BA.NISHMENT. 57 

man towns, especially at Herborn in Nassau. Here he 
saw the Report on Ratich's method, published in 1612 
for the Universities of Jena and Giessen; and we find 
him shortly afterward writing his first book,* " Gram- 
matics faciUor is Prcecepta,''^ which was published at Prague 
in 1616. On his return to Moravia, he was appointed 
to the Brethren's school at Prerau, but (to use his own 
words) " being shortly after, at the age of twenty-four, 
called to the service of the Church, because that divine 
function challenged all my endeavors, these scholastic 
<'ares were laid aside." His pastoral charge was at Ful- 
neck, the headquarters of the Brethren. As such, it 
soon felt the effects of the Battle of Prague, being in 
the following year (1621) taken and plundered by the 
Spaniards. On this occasion, Comenius lost almost 
^verythir.g he possessed. The year after his wife died, 
and then his only child. In 1624, ail Protestant minis- 
ters were banished, and, in 1627, a new decree extended 
the banishment to Protestants of every description. Co- 
menius bore up against wave after wave of calamity 
with Christian courage and resignation, and his writings 
at this period were of great value to his fellow-sufferers. 
For a time he found a hiding-place in the family of a 
Bohemian nobleman. Baron Sadowsky, at Sloupna, in 
the Bohemian mountains, and in this retirement his at- 
tention was again directed to the science of teaching. 
The Baron had engaged Stadius, one of the proscribed, 
to educate his three sons, and, at Stadius' request, Come- 
nius wrote " some canons of a better method," for bis 
use. We find him, too, endeavoring to enrich the liter- 

* [For bibliography of Comenius, see Payne's " Short History of Edu- 
cation."] 



58 JOHN AMOS COMENIUS. J h- .^ 

ature of his mother-tongue, making a metrical transla- 
tion of the Psalms of David, and even writing imitations 
of Virgil, Ovid, and Cato's Bistichs. ^:;: . 

In 1627, however, the persecution waxed so hot that 
Comenius, with most of the Brethren, had to flee their 
country, never to return. On crossing the border, Co- 
menius and the exiles who accompanied him knelt down 
and prayed that God would not suffer his truth to fail 
out of their native land. 

Many of the banished, and Comenius among them, 
settled at the Polish town of Leszno, or, as the Germans 
call it, Lissa, near the Silesian frontier. Here there was 
an old established school of the Brethren, in which Co- 
menius found employment. Once more engaged in 
education, he earnestly set about improving the tradi- 
tional methods. As he himself says,* " Being, by God's 
permission, banished my country, with divers others, and 
forced, for sustenance, to apply myself to the instruction 
of youth, I gave my mind to the perusal of divers 
authors, and lighted upon many which in this age have 
made a beginning in reforming the' method of studies,! 
as Ratichius, Helvicus, Rhenius, Ritterus, Glaumius, 
Caecilius, and who indeed should have had the first places 
Joannes Valentinus Andrae, a man of a nimble and clear 
brain; as also Campanella and the Lord Verulam, those 
famous restorers of philosophy; — by reading of whom I 
was raised in good hope that at last those so many 
various sparks would conspire into a flame; yet observ- 
ing here and there some detects and gaps as it were, I 
could not contain myself from attempting something 
that might rest upon an immovable foundation, 

* Preface to the Prodromus. 



JANUA LINGUARUM. 59 

and which, if it could be once found out, should' 
not be subject to any ruin. Therefore, after many- 
workings and tossings of my thoughts, by reducing 
everything to the immovable laws of nature, I lighted 
upon my Bidactica Magna^ which shows the art of readily 
and solidly teaching all men all things." 

This work did not immediately see the light, but in 
1631, Comenius published a book which made him and 
the little Polish town where he lived, known throughout 
Europe and beyond it. This was the Janua LmguaruM' 
Reserata^ or " Gate of Tongues unlocked." Writing 
about it many years afterward he says that he never 
could have imagined that that little work, fitted only for- 
children {piierile istud opusculum)^ would have been re- 
ceived with applause by all the learned world. Letters- 
of congratulation came to him from every quarter; and 
the work was translated not only into Greek, Bohemian^, 
Polish, Swedish, Belgian, English, French, Spanish,, 
Italian, Hungarian, but also into Turkish, Arabic, Per- 
sian, and even *' Mogolic, which is familiar in the East 
Indies." (Dedication of Schola Ludus in Vol. I. of col- 
lected works.)* 

Incited by the applause of the learned, Comenius now 
planned a scheme of universal knowledge, to impart 
which a series of works would have to be written, far 
exceeding what the resources and industry of one man,. 
however great a scholar, could produce. He therefore 

♦ Bayle, speaking of the Janua in his article on Comenius (Diet, sub., 
v.), says: " Quand Comenius n' aurait public que ce livre la, il se serait 
immortalise," [Had Comenius publis^hed no other book than this he would. 
have immortalized himself]. He published a more celebrated book than 
this (viz., Obis Pictus), and yet his " immortality" seems already of the^ 
leeblest. 



^0 JOHN AMOS COMENIUS. 

looked about for a patron to supply money for his sup- 
port, and that of his assistants, whilst these works were 
in progress. "The vastness of the labors I contem- 
plate," he writes to a Polish nobleman, " demands that 
I should have a wealthy patron, whether we look at; 
their extent, or at the necessity of securing assistants, 
K)r at the expenses generally." 

At Leszno there seemed no prospect of his obtaining 
the aid he required; but his fame now procured him 
invitations from distant countries. First he received a 
call to improve the schools of Sweden. After declining 
this, he was induced by his English friends to under- 
take a journey to London, where Parliament had shown 
its interest in the matter of education, and had em- 
ployed Hartlib, an enthusiastic admirer of Oomenius, 
to attempt some reforms. Hartlib procured an order 
summoning Comenius, who gives the following account 
•of his journey: — 

" When seriously proposing to abandon the thorny 
studies of Didactics, and pass on to the pleasing studies 
of philosophical truth, I find myself again among the 
same thorns. . . . After the Pansophm Prodromu8 
had been published Rnd dispersed through various 
kingdoms of Europe, many of the learned approved of 
the object and plan of the work, but despaired of its 
ever being accomplished by one man alone, and there- 
fore advised that a college of learned men should be 
instituted to carry it into effect. Mr. S. Hartlib, who 
had forwarded the publication of the Pansophm Prodro- 
.mu8 in England, labored earnestly in this matter, and 
endeavored, by every possible means, to bring together 
.for this purpose a number of men of intellectual activity. 



IN LONDON. 61 

And at lenarth, having found one or two, he invited me 
also, with many very strong entreaties. As my friends 
consented to my departure, 1 proceeded to London, and 
arrived there on the day of the autumnal equinox, 1641, 
and I then learned that I had been called thither by an 
order of Parliament. But in consequence of the King's 
having gone to Scotland, the Parliament had been dis- 
missed for three months, and consequently I had to 
winter in London, my friends in the meantime examin- 
ing the 'Apparatus Philosophicus,' small though it was 
at that time. ... At length Parliament having 
assembled, an<l my presence being known, I was com- 
manded to wait until after some important business 
having been transacted, a Commission should be issued 
to certain wise and learned men, from amongst them- 
selves, to hear me, and be informed of my plan. As an 
earnest, moreover, of their intentions^ they communi- 
cated to me their purpose to assign to us a college with 
revenues, whence some men of learning and industry, 
selected from any nation, might be honorably sustained, 
either for a certain number of years, or in perpetuity. 
The Savoy in London, and beyond London, Winchester, 
and again near the city, Chelsea, were severally men- 
tioned, and inventories of the latter, and of its revenues, 
were communicated to me. So that nothing seemed 
more certain than that the design of the great Yerulam 
to open a Universal College of all nations, devoted solely 
to the advancement of the sciences was now in the way 
of being carried into effect. But a rumor that Ireland 
was in a state of commotion, and that more than 200,- 
000 of the English there had been slaughtered in one 
night, the sudden departure of the King from London, 



^2 JOHN AMOS COMENIUS. 

and the clear indications that a most cruel war was on 
1;he point of breaking out, threw all these plans into con- 
fusion, and compelled me and my friends to hasten our 
Teturn." 

While Co.nenius was in England, wTiere he stayed till 
August, 16 42, he received an invitation to France. This 
invitation, which he did not accept, came perhaps 
through his correspondent Mersenne, a man of great 
learning, who is said to have been highly esteemed and 
often consulted by Descartes. It is characteristic of the 
:State of opinion in such matters in those days, that Mer- 
senne tells Comenius of a certain Le Maire, by whose 
method a boy of six years old, might, with nine months* 
instructions, acquire a perfect knowledge of three lan- 
guages. Mersenne also had dreams of a universal 
alphabet, and even of a universal lang4iage.^ 

Comenius' hopes of assistance in England being at an 
=end, he thought of returning to Leszno, but a letter now 
o-eached him from a rich Dutch merchant, Lewis de 
Geer, who offered him a home and means for carrying 
•out his plans. This Lewis de Geer, "The Grand 
Almoner of Europe," as Comenius called him, displayed 
a princely munificence in the assistance he gave the ex- 
iled Protesants. At this time he was living at Nordcop- 
ang in Sweden. Comenius having now found such a 
patron as he was seeking, set put from England and 
joined him there. 

Soon after the arrival of Comenius in Sweden, the 
great Oxenstiern sent him to Stockholm, and with John 
iSkyte, the Chancellor of Upsal University, examined 
him in several interviews about his system. " From my 
«early youth," said Oxenstiern, "I observed something 



IN SWEDEN. 63 

forced and incoherent in the method of instruction com- 
monly used, but could not discover where the impedi- 
ment lay. At length being sent by ray King, of glorious 
memory, as a legate to Germany, I held conferences 
there on the subject with various learned men, and when 
I was informed that Ratich had attempted an amend- 
ment of the method, I could not rest till I had had a 
personal interview with him; when, instead of favoring 
me with a conference, he presented me with a large 
quarto volume. I went through the task imposed upon 
me, and then perceived that he had succeeded in discov- 
ering the diseases of the schools, but the remedies he 
suggested seemed very insufficient. Your remedies rest 
upon a surer foundation." Comenius said it was his 
wish to get beyond the teaching of boys to a great 
philosophical, or rather " pansophical " work. But both 
Oxenstiern and Skyte urged him to confine himself, 
for the present, to a task less ambitious, but more prac- 
tically useful. "My counsel," said Oxenstiern, "is that 
you first satisfy the wants of the schools by rendering 
a knowledge of the Latin language of easier acquisition, 
and thereby preparing the path of a readier approach 
toward those more sublime studies. As De Geer gave 
the same advice, Comenius felt himself constrained to 
follow it, so he agreed to settle at Elbing in Prussia, and 
there write a work on teaching, in which the principles 
of the " Didacttca Magna " should be worked out with es- 
pecial reference to teaching languages. Notwithstand- 
ing the remonstrances of his English friends, to which 
Comenius would gladly have listened, he was kept by 
Oxenstiern and De Geer strictly to his agreement, and 
thus, much against his will, he was held fast for eight 



64 JOHN AMOS COMENIUS. 

years in what he calls the *'miry entanglements of lo- 
gomachy." 

Elbing, Avhere, after a journey to Leszno to fetch his 
family (for he had married again), Comenius now set- 
tled, is in West Prussia, 36 miles southeast of Dantzic. 
From ISVV to 1660, an English trading company was 
settled here with which the family of Hartlib is said in 
one account to have been connected. This perhaps is 
one reason why (-omenius chose this town for his resi- 
dence. But Hartlib, instead of assisting with money, 
seems at this time to have needed assistance, for in 
October, 1642, Comenius writes to De Geer that he 
fears Fundanius and Hartlib are suffering from want, 
and that he intends for them 200/. promised by the Lon- 
don booksellers: he suggests that De Geer shall give 
them 30/. each meanv/hile. 

The relation between Comenius and his patron natur- 
ally proved a difficult one. The Dutchman thought that 
as he supported Comenius, and contributed something 
more for the assistants, he might expect of Comenius 
that he would devote all his time to the scholastic treat- 
ise he had undertaken. Comenius, however, was a man 
of immense energy and of widely extended sympathies 
and connections. He was a " bishop " of the religious 
body to which he belonged, and in this capacity he en- 
gaged in controversy, and attended some religious con- 
ferences. Then, again, pupils were pressed upon him, 
and as money to pay live writers whom he kept at work 
was always running short, he did not decline them. De 
Geer complained of this, and supplies were not furnished 
with wonted regularity. In 1647 Comenius writes to 
Hartlib that he is almost overwhelmed with cares, and 



It 



AT LESZNO AGAIN. 65 

sick to death of writing begging-letters. Yet in this 
year he found means to publish a book " On the Causes 
of this (i. e., the Thirty Years') War," in which the 
Roman Catholics are attacked with great bitterness — a 
bitterness for which the position of the writer affords 
too good an excuse. 

The year 1648 brought with it the downfall of all 
Comenius' hopes of returning to his native land. The 
Peace of Westphalia was concluded without any pro- 
vision being made for the restoration of the exiles. But 
though thus doomed to pass the remaining years of his 
life in banishment, Comenius, in this year, seemed to 
have found an escape from all his pecuniary difficulties. 
The senior bishop, the head of the Moravian Brethren, 
died, and Comenius was chosen to succeed him. In con- 
sequence of this, Comenius returned to Leszno, where 
due provision was made for him by the Brethren. Be- 
fore he left Elbiug, however, the fruit of his residence 
there, ^'^ Methodus Linguarum Novissima''^ [Newest Lan- 
guage Method], had been submitted to a commission of 
learned Swedes, and approved by them. The MS. went 
with him to Leszno, where it was published. 
f^As head of the Moravian Church, there now devolved 
upon Comenius the care of all the exiles, and his wide- 
spread reputation enabled him to get situations for 
many of them in all Protestant countries. Indeed, he 
was now so much connected with the science of educa- 
tion, that even his post at Leszno did not prevent his 
receiving and accepting a call to reform the schools at 
Transylvania. A model school was formed at Saros- 
Patak, in which Comenius labored from 1650 till 1654. 
At this time he wrote his most celebrated book, which 

D 



66 JOHN AMOS COMENIUS. 

is indeed only an abridgement of his " Janua " with the 
important addition of pictures, and sent it to Niirnberg, 
where it appeared three years later (1657). This was 
the famous " Orhis Picf,m " [The world in Pictures]. 

Full of trouble as Comenius' life had hitherto been, 
its greatest calamity was still before him. After he was 
again settled at Leszno, Poland was invaded by the 
Swedes, on which occasion the sympathies of the Breth- 
ren were with their fellow-Protestants, and Comenius 
was imprudent enough to write a congratulatory address 
to the Swedish King. A peace followed, by the terms 
of which, several towns, and Leszno among them, were 
made over to Sweden, but when the King withdrew, the 
Poles took up arms again, and Leszno, the headquarters 
of the Protestants, the town in which the chief of the 
Moravian Brethren had written his address welcoming 
the enemy, was taken and plundered. 

Comenius and his family escaped, but his house was 
marked for special violence, and nothing was preserved. 
His sole remaining possessions were the clothes in which 
he and his family traveled. All his books and manu- 
scripts were burnt, among them his valued work on 
Pansophia, and a Latin-Bohemian and Bohemian-Latin 
Dictionary, giving words, phrases, idioms, adages and 
aphorisms — a book on which he had been laboring for 
forty years. " This loss," he writes, " I shall cease to 
lament only when I cease to breathe." After wandering 
for some time about Germany, and being prostrated by 
fever at Hamburg, he at length came to Amsterdam, 
where Lawrence De Geer, the son of his deceased 
patron, gave him an asylum. Here were spent the 
remaining years of his life in ease and dignity. Com- 



POLITICAL MISFORTUNES. 67 

passion for his misfortunes was united with veneration 
for his learning and piety. He earned a sufficient in- 
come by giving instruction in the families of the 
wealthy, and by the liberality of De Geer he was ena- 
bled to publish a line folio edition of all his writings on 
Education (1657). His political works, however, were 
to the last a source of trouble to him. His hostility to 
the Pope and the House of Hapsburg made him the 
dupe of certain " prophets " whose soothsayings he pub- 
lished as " Lux in Tenehris " [Light in Darkness]. One of 
these prophets, who had announced that the Turk was 
to take Vienna, was executed at Pressburg, and the 
^^ Lux in Tenehris''^ at the same time burnt by the hang- 
man. Before the news of this disgrace reached Amster- 
dam, Comenius was no more. He died in the year 1671, 
at the advanced age of eighty, and with him terminated 
the office of Chief Bishop among the Moravian 
Brethren. 

Before Comenius, no one had brought the mind of a 
philosopher to bear practically on the subject of educa- 
tion. Montaigne, Bacon, Milton, had advanced princi- 
ples, leaving others to see to their application. A few able 
schoolmasters, as Ascham and Ratich, had investigated 
new methods, but had made success in teaching the test 
to which they appealed, rather than any abstract princi- 
ple. Comenius was at once a philosopher who had 
learnt of Bacon, and a schoolmaster who had earned his 
livelihood by teaching the rudiments. Dissatisfied with 
the state of education as he found it, he sought for a bet- 
ter system by an examination of the laws of Nature. 
Whatever is thus established, we must allow to be on an 
immovable foundation, and, as Comenius himself says. 



68 JOHN AMOS COMENIUS. 

*'not liable to any ruin;" but looking back on the fruit 
of Comenius' labors, we find that much which he 
thought thus based, was not so in reality — that he often 
believed he was appealing to Nature, when in truth he 
was merely using fanciful illustrations from her. But 
whatever mistakes he and others may have made in con- 
sulting the oracle, it is no proof of wisdom to attempt, 
as " practical men " often do, to use these mistakes in 
disparagement of the oracle itself; and because some 
have gone wrong when they thought they were follow- 
ing Nature, to treat every appeal to her with contempt. 
It will hardly be disputed, when broadly stated, that 
there are laws of Nature which must be obeyed in deal- 
ing with the mind, as with the body. No doubt these 
laws are not so easily established in the first case as in 
the second, but whoever in any way assists or even tries 
to assist in the discovery, deserves our gratitude, and 
greatly are we indebted to him who first boldly set about 
the task, and devoted to it years of patient labor. 

Every one who has studied Comenius' volumiuous 
writings is agreed that the " Bidactica Magna^'' though 
one of his earlier works, contains, in the best form, the 
principles he afterward endeavored to work out in the 
".TawMa," ^' Orbis Pictm,'*^ and "• Novissima Methodus .'''' A 
short account of this book will give some notion of 
what Comenius did for education. 

We live, says Comenius, a threefold life — a vegeta- 
tive, an animal, and an intellectual or spiritual. Of 
these, the first is perfect in the womb, the last in heaven. 
He is happy who comes with healthy body into the 
world, much more he who goes with healthy spirit out 
of it. According to the heavenly idea, man (1) should 



PRINCIPLES FROM NATURE. 69 

know all things; (2) should be master of all things, and 
of himself; (3) should refer everything to God. So 
that within us Nature has implanted the seeds of (1) 
learning, (2) virtue, and (3) piety. To bring these to 
maturity is the object of education. All men require 
education, and God has made children unfit for other 
employments that they may have leisure to learn. 

But schools have failed, and instead of keeping to the 
true object of education, and teaching the foundations, 
relations, and intentions of all the most important 
things, they have neglected even the mother- tongue, and 
confined the teaching to Latin; and yet that has been so 
badly taught, and so much time has been wasted over 
grammar rules and dictionaries, that from ten to twenty 
years are spent in acquiring as much knowledge of Latin 
as is speedily acquired of any modern tongue. 

The cause of this want of success is that the system 
does not follow nature. Everything natural goes 
smoothly and easily. There must, therefore, be no pres- 
sure. Learning should come to children as swimming 
to fish, flying to birds, running to animals. As Aristotle 
says, the desire of knowledge is implanted in man: and 
the mind grows as the body does — by taking proper 
nourishment, not by being stretched on the rack. 

If we would ascertain how teaching and learning are 
to have good results, we must look to the known pro- 
xiesses of Nature and Art. A man sows seed, and it 
comes up he knows not how, but in sowing it he must 
attend to the requirements of Nature. Let us then look 
to Nature to find out how instruction is to be sown in 
young minds. We find that Nature waits for the fit 
time. Then, too, she has prepared the material before 



70 JOHN AMOS COMENIU8. 

she gives it form. In our teaching we constantly run 
counter to these principles of hers. We give instruction 
before the young minds are ready to receive it. We 
give the form before the material. Words are taught 
before the things to which they refer. When a foreign 
tongue is to be taught, we commonly give the form, i. e.^ 
the grammatical rules, before we give the material, i. e., 
the language, to which the rules apply. We should be- 
gin with an author, or properly prepared translation- 
book, and abstract rules should never come before the 
examples. 

Again, Nature begins each of her works with its in- 
most part. Moreover, the crude form comes first, then 
the elaboration of the parts. The architect, acting on 
this principle, first makes a rough plan or model, and 
then by degrees designs the details; last of all he attends 
to the ornamentation. In teaching, then, let the inmost 
part, i. e., the understanding of the subject, come first; 
then let the thing understood be used to exercise the 
memory, the speech, and the hands; and let every lan- 
guage, science, and art be taught first in its rudimentary 
outline; then more completely with example and rules; 
finally, with exceptions and anomalies. Instead of this^ 
some teachers are foolish enough to require beginners to 
get up all the anomalies in Latin Grammar, and the dia- 
lects in Greek. 

Again, as nature does nothing 'per saltum [at a leap] 
nor halts when she has begun, the whole course of stud- 
ies should be~ arranged in strict order, so that the earlier 
studies prepare the way for the latter. Every year^ 
every month, every day and hour even, should have its 
task marked out beforehand, and the plan should be 



ORDER OF MENTAL DEVELOPMENT. 7l 

rigidly carried out. Much loss is occasioned by absence 
of boys from school, and by changes in the instruction. 
Iron that might be wrought with one heating should 
not be allowed to get cold, and be heated over and over 
again. 

Nature protects her work from injurious influences, so 
boys should be kept from injurious companionships and 
books. 

In a chapter des'oted to the principles of easy teach- 
ing, Comenius lays down, among rules similar to the 
foregoing, that children will learn if they are taught 
only what they have a desire to learn, with due regard 
to their age and the method of instruction, and 
especially when everything is first taught by means of 
the senses. On this point Comenius laid great stress, 
and ho was, I believe, the first who did so. Education 
should proceed, he said, in the following order: first, 
educate the senses, then the memory, then the intellect; 
last of all the critical faculty. This is the order of Na- 
ture. The child first perceives through the senses. 
Nihil est in intellectu quod nofi prius in sensu [There is noth- 
ing in the mind that was not first in the senses]. These 
perceptions are stored in the memory, and called up by 
the imagination. By comparing one wilh another, the 
understanding forms general ideas, and at length the 
judgment decides between the false and the true. By 
keeping to this order, Comenius believed it would be 
possible to make learning entirely pleasant to the pupils, 
however young. Here Comenius agreed with the 
Jesuits, and in part he w^ould use the same means to 
make the road to learning agreeable. Like them, he 
would have short school-hours, and would make great 



72 JOHN i\MOS COMENIUS. 

use of praise and blame; but he did not depend, as they 
did, almost exclusively on emulation. He would have 
the desire of learning fostered in every possible way — 
by parents, by teachers, by school buildings and appa- 
ratus, by the subjects themselves, by the method of 
teaching them, and lastly, by the public authorities. 
(1) The parents must praise learning and learned men, 
must show children beautiful books, etc., must treat the 
teachers with great respect. (2) The teacher must be 
kind and fatherly, he must distribute praise and reward, 
and must always, where it is possible, give the children 
something to look at. (3) The school buildings must 
be light, airy, and cheerful, and well furnished with 
apparatus, as pictures, maps, models, collections of speci- 
mens. (4) The subjects taught must not be too hard 
for the learner's comprehension, and the more entertiin- 
ing parts of them must be especially dwelt upon. (5) 
The method must be natural, and everything that is not 
essential to the subject or is beyond the pupil must be 
omitted. Fables and allegories should be introduced, 
and enigmas given for the pupils to guess. (7) The 
authorities must appoint public examinations and reward 
merit. 

Nature helps herself in various ways, so the pupils 
should have every assistance given them. It should 
especially be made clear what the pupils are to learn, 
and how they should learn it. 

The pupils should be punished for offences against 
morals only. If they do not learn the fault is with the 
teacher. 

One of Comenius' most distinctive principles was, that 
the knowledge of things should be communicated together 



COURSE OF INSTRUCTION. 73 

with the knowledge of words. This, together with his de- 
sire of submitting everything to the pupil's senses, would 
have introduced a great change in the course of instruc- 
tion, which was then, as it has for the most part contin- 
ued, purely literary. We should learn, says Comenius, 
as much as possible, not from books, but from the great 
book of Nature, from heaven and earth, from oaks and 
beeches. 

When languages are to be learnt, he would have them 
taught separately. Till the pupil is from eight to ten 
years old, he should be instructed only in the mother- 
tongue, and about things. Tlien other languages can 
be acquired in about a year each; Latin (which is to be 
studied more thoroughly) in about two years. Every 
language must be learnt by use rather than by rules; 
i. e., it must be learnt by hearing, reading, and re-read- 
ing, transcribing, attempting imitations in writing, and 
verbally, and by using the language in conversation. 
Rules assist and confirm practice, but they must come 
after, not before it. The first exercises in, a language 
should take for their subject something of which the sense 
is already known, so that the mind may be fixed on the 
words and their connections.* The Catechism and Bible 
History may be used for this purpose. 

Considering the classical authors not suited to boys' 
understanding, and not fit for the education of Chris- 
tians, Comenius proposed writing a set of Latin manu- 
als for the different stages between childhood and 
manhood: these were to be called, " Vestihulum,^^ [Thresh- 
hold], '■'- Janua^^ [Gate], "Pfl;^«^?^w," [Palace], '■^ Thesau- 

* Comenius here follows Ratich, who, as I have mentioned above 
<p. —), required beginners to study the translation hefore the original. 



74 JOHN AMOS COMENIUS. 

rws," [Treasure House]. The "Vestibulum" and "Janua" 
were really carried out. 

In Comenius' scheme there were to be four kinds of 
schools for a perfect educational course: 1st, the mother's 
breast for infancy; 2d, the public vernacular school for 
children, to which all should be sent from six years old 
till twelve; 3d, the Latin school or Gymnasium; 4th, 
residence at a University and traveling, to complete the 
course. 

As the Ludus liter arius sen schola vernacula, [Elementary 
school or vernacular instruction] was a very distinctive 
feature in Comenius' plan, it may be worth while to give 
his programme of studies. In this school the children 
should learn — 1st, to read and write the mother-tongue 
well, both with writing and printing letters; 2d, to com- 
pose grammatically; 3d, to cipher; 4th, to measure and 
weigh; 5th, to sing, at first popular airs, then from 
music; 6th, to say by heart sacred psalms and hymns; 
7th, Catecism, Bible History and texts; 8th, moral rules, 
with examples; 9th, economy and politics, as far as they 
could be understood; 10th, general history of the world; 
11th, figure of the earth and motion of stars, etc., phys- 
ics and geography, especially of native land; 12th, gen- 
eral knowledge of arts and handicrafts. 

Each school was to be divided into six classes, cor- 
responding to the six years the pupil should spend in it. 
The hours of work were to be, in school, two hours in 
the morning and two in the afternoon, with nearly the 
jsanie amount of private study. In the morning the mind 
and memory were to be exercised, in the afternoon the 
hands and voice. Each class was to have its proper les- 
son-book written expressly for it, so as to contain every- 



75 

thing that class had to learn. When a lesson was to be 
got by heart from the book, the teacher was first to read 
it to the class, explain it, and re-read it; the boys then 
to read it aloud by turns till one of them offered to re- 
peat it without book; the others were to do the 
same as soon as they were able, till all had repeated it. 
This lesson was then to be worked over again as a writ- 
ing lesson, etc. In the higher forms of the vernacular 
school a modern language was to be taught and duly 
practised. 

From this specimen of the " Didadica Ma^na^^ thevesider 
will see the kind of reforms at which Comenius aimed* 
Before his time the Jesuits alone had had a complete edu- 
cational course planned out, and had pursued a uniform 
method in carrying this plan through. They, too, 
already were distinguit^hed for their endeavors to make 
learning pleasant to their pupils, to lead, not to drive 
them. But Comenius, advancing so far with the Jesu- 
its, entirely differed trom them as to the subjects to be 
taught. The Jesuits' was as purely a literary training 
as that in our public schools. Comenius was among the 
first who laid stress on the teaching about things, and 
called in the senses to do their part in the work of early 
education. Thus he was the forerunner of Pestalozzi, 
and of the champions of science as Tyndall and H. Spen- 
cer among ourselves. 

It was not his principles, however, that first attracted 
the notice of Comenius' contemporaries, but his book, 
^' Janua Linguarum Reurata^'' in which, with very imper- 
fect success he endeavored to carry out those principles. 

For the idea of the work Comenius was beholden to a 
Jesuit, as he candidly confesses. It seems that one 



76 JOHN AMOS COMENIUS. 

Batty, a Jesuit of Irish birth, engaged in the Jesuit col- 
lege of Salamanca, had endeavored to construct a 
^'Noah's Ark for words;" i. e., a work treating shortly 
of all kinds of subjects, in such a way as to introduce in 
a natural connection every word in the Latin language.* 
" The idea," says Comenius, *' was much better than the 
execution. Nevertheless, inasmuch as they (the Jesuits) 
were the prime inventors, we thankfully acknowledge 
it, nor will we upbraid thera with those errors they have 
committed." f The plan commended itself to Comenius 
on various grounds. First, he had a notion of giving 
an outline of all knowledge before anything was taught 
in detail. Next, he could by such a book connect the 
teaching about simple things with instruction in the 
Latin words which applied to them. And thirdly, he 
hoped by this means to give such a complete Latin vo- 
cabulary as to render the use of Latin easy for all require- 
ments of modern society. He accordingly wrote a 
short account of things in general, which he put in the 
form of a dialogue, and this he published in Latin and 
German at Leszno about 1531. The success of this work, 
as we have already seen, was prodigious. No doubt the 
spirit which anirnated Bacon was largely diffused among 
educated men in all countries, and they hailed the ap- 
pearance of a book which called the youth from the 
study of old philosophical ideas to observe the facts 
around them. 

The countrymen of Bacon were not backward in 
adopting the new work, as the following, from the title- 



* This book attracted some notice in England. An edition witli Eng- 
lish instead of Spanish, was published in London about 1515. 



t Preface to Anchoran's translation of Janua. 



J 



77 

page of a volume in the British Museum, will showi 
"The Gate of Tongues Unlocked and Opened; or else, 
a Seminary or Seed-jjlot of all Tongues and Sciences. 
That is, a short way of teaching and thoroughly learn- 
ing, within a year and a half at the furthest, the Latin, 
English, French, and any other tongue, with the 
ground and foundation of arts and sciences, com- 
prised under a hundred titles and 1058 periods. In 
Latin first, and now, as a token of thankfulness, brought 
to light in Latin, English, and French, in the behalf of 
the most illustrious Prince Charles, and of British, French,, 
and L-ish youth. The 4th edition much enlarged, by 
the labor and industry of John Anchoran, Licentiate in 
Divinity, London. Printed by Edward Griffin for 
Michael Sparke, dwelling at the Blew Bible in Green. 
Arbor, 1639." 

In the preface to this volume we have the complaint 
which has reproduced itself in various forms up to the 
present time, that the " youth was delayed with gram- 
mar precepts infinitely tedious, perplexed, obscure, and 
(for the most part) unprofitable, and that for many 
years." From this barren region the pupil was to es- 
cape to become acquainted with things. " Come on," 
says the teacher in the opening dialogue; "let us go 
forth into the open air. There you shall view whatso- 
ever God produced from the beginning, and doth yet 
affect by nature. Afterward we will go into towns, shops, 
schools, where you shall see how men do both apply 
those Divine works to their uses, and also instruct them- 
selves in arts, manners, tongues. Then we will enter 
into houses, courts, and palaces of princes, to see in what 
manner communities of men are governed. At last we 



18 JOHN AMOS COMENIUS. 

■will visit temples, where you shall observe how diversely 
mortals seek to worship their Creator and to be spiritu- 
ally united unto Him, and how He by His Almightiness 
disposeth all things." (This is from the 1656 edition, by 
" W. D.") 

The book is still amusing, but only from the quaint 
manner in which the mode of life two hundred years ago 
is described. 

But though parts of the book may on first reading 
have gratified the youth of the seventeenth century, a 
great deal of it gave scanty information about difficult J 
subjects, such as physiology, geometry, logic, rhetoric, * 
and that, too, in the driest and dullest way. Moreover, Co- 
menius boasts that no important word occurs twice; so J 
that the book to attain the end of giving a perfect stock ' 
of Latin words, would have to be read and re-read till it 
was almost known by heart; and however amusing boys 
might find an account of their toys written in Latin the 
first time of reading, the interest would somewhat wear 
away by the fifth or sixth time. We can not then feel J 
much surprised on reading this "general verdict," written i 
some thirty years later, touching those earlier works of 
Comenius: "They are of singular use, and very advan- 
tageous to those of more discretion (especially to such 
as have already got a smattering in Latin), to help their 
memories to retain what they have scatteringly gotten 
here and there, and to furnish them with many words 
which perhaps they had not formerly read or so well ob- 
served; but to young children, as those that are ignorant 
altogether of most things and words, they prove rather a 
mere toil and burden than a delight and furtherance.'** 

* Hoole's preface to his translation of Orhis Pictus. 



79 

The ^^ Janua^'' would, therefore, have had but a short- 
lived popularity with teachers, and a still shorter with 
learners, if Comenius had not carried out his principle 
of appealing to the senses, and called in the artist. The 
result was the " Orhis P ictus ^^ a book which proved a 
favorite with young and old, and maintained its ground 
in many a school for more than a century. The " OtUb " 
was, in substance, the same as the " Janua^'' though 
abbreviated.; but it had this distinctive feature, that each 
subject was illustrated by a small engraving, in which 
everything named in the letter-press below was marked 
with a number, and its name was found connected with 
the same number in the text. I am sorry I can not give 
a specimen of this celebrated book with its quaint pic- 
tures. The artist, of course, was wanting in the techni- 
cal skill which is now commonly displayed even in very 
cheap publications, but this renders his delineations none 
the less entertaining. As a picture of the life and man- 
ners of the seventeenth century, the work has great his- 
torical interest, which will, I hope, secure for it another 
English edition; especially as the last (that of 1777, re- 
printed in America in 1812), which is now occasionally 
to be met with, is far inferior to those of an earlier 
date. 

In the beginning of the tract to Hartlib, Milton 
would seem to deny that he had learned anything from 
Comenius. Whether this is his meaning or not, he gives 
expression in the tract to the principle of which Come- 
nius was the great exponent. *' Because one's under- 
standing can not, in this body, found itself but on sen- 
sible things, nor arrive so clearly to the knowledge of 
God and things invisible as by orderly conning over the 



80 JOHN AMOS COMENIUS. 

visible and inferior creature, the same method is neces- 
sarily to be followed in all discreet teaching." This 
conviction, which bore fruit in the Baconian philosophy^ 
was systematically brought to bear by Comenius on the 
instruction of youth. 



[The best life of Comenius is by Prof. S. S. Laurie, of which 
an American edition has been published at $1.00. Much matter 
of interest is also given in Prof. Payne's " Short History of Edu- 
cation," 50 cts. Copies of the Janua and of the Orbis Pieties are 
usually to be found in the collection of Pedagogical Books for 
sale by C. W. Bardeen, Syracuse, N. Y.] 



J 



V. 

LOCKE. 

Among the writers ou education and inventors of new 
methods, there are only two Englishmen who have a 
European celebrity — Locke and Hamilton. The latter 
of these did, in fact, little more than carry out a sug- 
gestion of the former, so that almost all the influence 
which England has had on the theory of education must 
be attributed to Locke alone. Locke's authority on this 
subject has indeed been due chiefly to his fame as a 
philosopher. His " Thoughts on Education," had they 
proceeded from an unknown author, would probably have 
never gained him a reputation even in his native country ; 
and yet, when we read them as the work of the great 
philosopher, we feel that they are not unworthy of him. 
He was no enthusiast, conscious of a mission to renovate 
the human race by some grand educational discovery; 
but as a man of calm good sense, who found himself 
encharged with the bringing up of a youug nobleman, 
he examined the ordinary education of the day, and 
when it proved unsatisfactory, he set about such altera- 
tions as seemed expedient. His thoughts were written 
for the advice of a friend, and, as we may infer from the 
title, are not intended as a complete treatise. The book, 
however, has placed its author in the first rank of those 
innovators whose innovations, after a struggle of two 

E 



82 JOHN LOCKE. 

hundred years,' have not been adopted, and yet seem 
now more than ever likely to make their way. 

Locke's thoughts were concerned exclusively with the 
training of a young gentleman, at a time when gentle- 
men were a caste having little in common with " the 
abhorred rascality." The education of those of inferior 
station might be of interest and importance to individ- 
uals, but the nation was chiefly concerned with the 
bringing up of its gentlemen. " That most to be taken 
care of ," he writes, "is the gentleman's calling; for if 
those of that rank are by their education once set right, 
they will quickly bring all the rest into order." 

Locke would have the education of a gentleman 
intrusted to a tutor. His own experience had made him 
no friend to grammar-schools, and while he admits the 
inconveniences of home education, he makes light of 
them in comparison with the dangers of a system in 
which the influence of schoolmates is greater than that 
of schoolmasters. Locke's argument is this: It is the 
business of the master to train the pupils in virtue and 
good manners, much more than to communicate learn- 
ing. This function, however, must of necessity be neg- 
lected in schools. " Not that 1 blame the schoolmaster 
in this, or think it to be laid to his charge. The differ- 
ence is great between two or three pupils in the same 
house and three or fourscore boys lodged up and 
down; for let the master's industry and skill be never 
so great, it is impossible that he should have fifty or a 
hundred scholars under his eye any longer than they are 
in the school together; nor can it be expected that he 
should instruct them successfully in anything but their 
books; the forming of their minds and manners requir- 



PREFERENCE FOR PRIVATE TEACHING. 83 

log a constant attention and particular application to 
every single boy, which is impossible in a numerous 
flock, and would be wholly in vain (could he have time 
to study and correct every one's particular defects and 
wrong inclinations), when the lad was to be left to him- 
self, or the prevailing infection of his fellows the great- 
est part of the four-and-twenty hours." Again he says, 
*' Till you can find a school wherein it is possible for the 
master to look after the manners of his scholars, and can 
show as great effects of his care of forming their minds 
to virtue and their carriage to good-breeding, as of 
forming their tongues to the learned languages, you 
must confess that you have a strange value for words 
when preferring the languages of the ancient Greeks and 
Romans to that which made them such brave men, you 
think it worth while to hazard your son's inr.ocence for 
a little Greek and Latin. For as for that boldness and 
spirit which lads get among their playfellows at school, 
it has ordinarily such a mixture of rudeness and ill- 
turned confidence that those misbecoming and disin- 
genuous ways of shifting in the world must be un- 
learned, and all tincture washed out again to make way 
for better principles and such manners as make a trust- 
worthy man. He that considers how diametrically 
opposite the skill of living well and managing as a man 
should do his affairs in the world is to that malapertness, 
trickery, or violence learnt amongst schoolboys, will 
think the faults of a privater education infinitely to be 
preferred to such improvements, and will take care to 
preserve his child's innocence and modesty at home, as 
being more of kin and more in the way of those quali- 
ties which make a useful and able man." 



84 JOHN LOCKE. 

If we coDsider how far Locke is undoubtedly right in 
these remarks, we shall agree with him at least in two 
things: 1st, that virtue and good manners are more val- 
uable than school learning, or, indeed, any learning; 2dy 
that the influence of the masters over the boys' charac- 
ters in a large school (and I may add, in a small school 
also), is less than the influence of the boys on one 
another. Moreover, those who know much of school- 
boys will probably admit that their average morality is 
not high. Though not without strong generous im- 
pulses, the ordinary schoolboy-character is marked by 
selflshness — not a premeditated, calculating selfishness, 
but one which arises from the absence of high motives, 
and from a tacit understanding among boys that the 
rule is, " Every one for himself." High motives are no 
doubt uncommon in adult age, and the same rule is 
sometimes acted on then also, but custom requires us, 
except in the case of very near relations, to treat one 
another with outward respect and consideration — in 
other words, to behave unselfishly in social intercourse, 
and no such custom is established among schoolboys. 
They are, therefore, as a rule unmannerly in their be- 
havior to one another. Vices, moreover, though not so 
prevalent as bad manners, are well known in all schools. 
Lying is often found, especially among young boys; bad 
language, and worse, among younger and elder alike. 
The natural deduction would seem to be that large 
schools are the worst possible places in which to train 
boys to virtue and good manners. 

This deduction, however, is very far from the truth. 
The direct influence of the private tutor is, I believe, less, 
and the indirect influence of the masters of a school 



HIS ARGUMENT EXAMINED. 85 

more^ than Locke and those who side with him imagine. 
Indeed, the influence of a really great head-master over 
the whole school is immense, as was proved by Dr. 
Arnold. Then, again, the system and the traditions of 
a great school are very powerful, and almost compel a 
boy to aim at the established standard of excellence, 
whereas the boy at home has no such standard before 
him, and the boy at the small school may possibly have 
one which is worse than none at all.* As far as our 
character depends on others, it is formed mainly by our 
companions at every age. Men have not enough in 
common with boys to be their companions, even when 
they are never out of their company. The character of 
boys must, therefore, be formed chiefly by hoys, and 
where they associate together in large numbers and are 
allowed as much freedom as is consistent with discipline, 

* " At nine or ten the masculine energies of the character are begin- 
ning to develop themselves ; or, if not, no discipline will better aid in their 
development than the bracing intercourse of a great English classical 
school. Even the selfish are there forced into accommodating themselves 
to a public standard of generosity, and the effeminate into conforming to 
a rule of manliness. I was myself at two public schools, and I think with 
gratitude of the benefits which I reaped from both; as also I think with 
gratitude of that guardian in whose quiet household I learned Latin so 
effectually. But the small private schools of which I had opportunities 
for gathering some brief experience— schools containing from thirty to 
forty boys, were models of ignoble manners, as regarded part of the 
Juniors, and of favoritsm as regarded the masters. Nowhere is the sub- 
limity of public justice so broadly exemplified as in an English public 
school on the old Edward VI. or Elizabeth foundation. There is not in 
the universe such an Areopagus of fair play and abhorrence of all crooked 
ways as an English mob, or one of the time-honored English ' foundation ' 
schools." (De Quincey's Autobiographic Sketches, Works, i. 150.) Of 
late years, the age at which boys are mostly sent to the great public 
schools has advanced from ten or eleven to thirteen or fourteen. I 
think this a gain where boys can be kept at home, but very much the 
reverse when they are sent as boarders to private schools. What we 
stand urgently in need of is good day schools for the younger boys of all 
-classes. 



86 JOHN LOCKE. 

the healthy feeling of " open-airiness," * the commoD 
sense of most, and the love of right which is found 
ultimately both in boys and men, prove most powerful 
in checking flagrant wrong-doing and forming a type of 
character which has many good points in it. 

But whichever side may seem to have the best of the 
argument, our public schools may fairly meet their 
assailants by an appeal to results. We know, indeed, 
that parents, as a rule, are too careless about the learn- 
ing their boys acquire at Eaton and Harrow, and that 
many leave these schools with little Latin, less Greek, 
and no book knowledge besides; but parents are not yet 
indifferent about the morals and manners of their child- 
ren, and if it were found that the generality of public 
school-men were less virtuous and less gentlemanly than 
the generality of those who had been educated else- 
where, our public schools could hardly enjoy their pres- 
ent popularity. 

Locke had himself acquired great influence over his 
pupil, a delicate youth, who, under Locke's care, became 
a strong man. By this the philosopher was led to exag- 
gerate the effects of formal education so much, that he 
ascribes it to nine parts out of ten in every man. I be- 
lieve this estimate to be quite erroneous. Nature seems 
to have placed a fairly healthy state, both of body and 
mind, as it were m stable equilibrium. There are certain 
things necessary for the existence of the body — food, 
air, exercise. But when a suflicient amount of these is 
once secured, the quantity and quality may vary con- 

* I borrow the phrase from Miss Davies, who, in her excellent little 
book on "The Higher Education of Women," advocates the starting of 
schools for girls on the model of our public schools. 



PHYSICAL TRAINING. 87 

Biderably, without making any important difference. 
Moreover, the healthy body has, to some extent, the 
power of resisting noxious influences. If we were as 
liable to injuries as anxious mothers suppose, we should 
have to give almost all our time and attention to the care 
of our health, and even then could hardly hope to pre- 
serve it. The same, probably, is true of the mind, though 
not to so great a degree. 

These facts are fully recognized by the majority of 
mankind, who look to them for a justification of laissez 
/aire [let alone]. But writers on education, on dietetics, 
and the like, in their great zeal against laissez /aire, gen- 
erally run in into the opposite extreme, and talk as if 
narrow indeed were the way that leads to health, and as 
if only the few who implicitly followed their directions 
could ever find it. 

If I agreed with Locke, that nine parts out of ten in 
the pupil were due to the master, I should also agree 
that the master of a school could not bestow proper 
attention on all the boys. 

As Locke had studied medicine, and had been pre- 
vented from undertaking the cure of other people's mal- 
adies only by his own, he naturally attached great 
importance to physical education, and begins his work 
with it. He was a champion of the hardening system 
which has, no doubt, as Mr. H. Spencer puts it, hard 
ened many children out of the world. Scanty clothing 
thin boots with holes to admit wet, hard fare, and irreg 
ular meals, are now condemned by all our best authori 
ties. In other particulars, where he seems more happy 
Locke's suggestions have become established customs 
We have got to believe in the use of cold water, though 



88 JOHN LOCKE. 

we should not think to appease the fears of mothers by 
quoting the exami^le of Seneca. But there are two or 
three points in Locke's very practical directions which 
are still worth special attention. He urges that all 
clothes should be loose, and speaks as emphatically as 
every doctor has spoken since against the madness of 
" strait-lacing." He rejoices that mothers can not 
attempt any improvements in their children's shapes be- 
fore birth; otherwise, says he, we should have no perfect 
children born. Do we not seem to hear the voice of 
Rousseau ? 

Another point on which he is very emphatic is, that 
action of the bowels should be secured daily at the same 
hour by the force of habit. 

The following quotation would have been thought 
folly only a few years ago. Now, it has a chance of a 
fair hearing. " Have a great care of tampering that 
way (i. e., with apothecaries' medicines), lest, instead of 
preventing, you draw on diseases. Nor even upon every 
little indisposition is physic to be given, or the physi- 
cian called to children, especially if he be a busy man 
that will presently fill their windows with gallipots and 
their stomachs with drugs. It is safer to leave them 
wholly to Nature than to put them into the hands of 
one forward to tamper, or that thinks children are to be 
cured in ordinary distempers by anything but diet, or 
by a method very liitle distant from it; it seeming suit- 
able both to my reason and experience, that the 
tender constitutions of children should have as little 
done to them as possible, and as the absolute necessity 
of the case requires." Among many practical sugges- 
tions which he gives in this part of the book, the follow- 



PHYSICAL TRAINING. 89 

iiig shows that his hardening discipline did not proceed 
from want of sympathy with the little ones. "Let 
children be very carefully aroused in the morning with 
the voice only, and let them have nothing but kind treat- 
ment before they are wide awake." * 

Locke's own summing up of his recommendations con- 
cerning the body and health is: "Plenty of open air, 
exercise and sleep, plain diet, no wine or strong drink, 
and very little or no physic; not too warm and strait 
clothes, especially the head and feet kept cold, and the 
feet often used to cold water, and exposed to wet." 

"As the strength of the body lies chiefly in being able 
to endure hardships, so also does that of the mind, and 
the great principle and foundation of all virtue and 
worth is placed in this — that a man is able to deny him- 
self his own desires, cross his own inclinations, and 
purely follow what reason directs as best, though the 
appetite leans the other way." 

Again, -he says, " He that has not mastery over his 
inclinations, he that knows not how to resist the impor- 
tunity of present pleasure or pain, for the sake of what 
reason tells him is fit to be done, wants the true princi- 
ple of virtue and industry, and is in danger of never be- 
ing good for anything. This temper then, therefore, 
so contrary to unguided Nature, is to be got betimes; 
and this habit, as the true foundation of future ability 
and happiness, is to be wrought into the mind, as early 
as may be, even from the first dawnings of any knowl- 
edge or apprehension in children, and so to be confirmed 
in them, by all the care and ways imaginable, by those who 

* Locke is, however, only copying from Montaigne, who tells us that, 
in his childhood, his father had him awakened by music . 



90 JOHN LOCKE. 

have the oversight of their education." Here the philos- 
opher seems to ground all virtue on Reason. Less intel- 
lectual people might be inclined to seek the ground of 
most virtue in the affections. 

"The practice of self-denial," says Locke, " is to be 
got and improved by custom — made easy and familiar 
by an early practice. The practice should be begun from 
their very cradles. Whenever the children craved what was 
not fit for them to have, they should not be permitted it 
because they were little and desired it. Nay, whatever 
they were importunate for, they should be sure, for that 
very reason, to be denied. The younger they are, the 
less, I think, are their unruly and disorderly appetites 
to be complied with; and the less reason they have of 
their own, the more are they to be under the absolute 
power and restraint of those in whose hands they are. 
From which, I confess, it will follow, that none but dis- 
creet people should be about them. 

" Be sure to establish the authority of a father as 
soon as the child is capable of submission, and can under- 
stand in whose power he is. If you would have him 
stand in awe of you, imprint it in his infancy, and as he ap- 
proaches more to a man admit him nearer to your famil- 
iarity, so shall you have him your obedient subject (as 
is fit) whilst he is a child, and your affectionate friend 
when he is a man." This passage advises a complete inver- 
sion of the ordinary mode, which is to fondle children when 
young, and " to keep them in their proper place " by a 
more distant behavior, and by the more rigorous exer- 
cise of authority, as they grow up. But is not the 
treatment Avhich estranges the son from the father 
wrong in both cases ? The difference of age puts only 



IDEAS OF DISCIPLINE. 92 

too great a gulf between them already. To make either 
the child or young man stand in awe of his father is not 
exactly the way to bridge this gulf over. This can only 
be done by the father's endeavoring to enter into the 
feelings of the son, and seeking his sympathy in return. 
As for establishing the parental authority, a consistent 
firmness will do this without the aid. of " the power de- 
rived from fear and awe." 

But, whilst advising that whatsoever rigor is necesary 
should be " the more used the younger children are," 
Locke is very strong against great severity. The chil- 
dren must be taught self-denial; but on the other side,, 
"if the mind be curbed or humbled too much in chil- 
dren, if their spirits be debased and humbled much by 
too strict a hand, over them, they lose all their vigor and 
industry, and are in a worse state than (in the other ex- 
treme). For extravagant young fellows that have live- 
liness and spirit come sometimes to be set right, and so- 
make able and great men; but dejected minds, timorous^ 
and tame, and low spirits are hardly ever to be raised,, 
and very seldom attain to anything." Slavish disci- 
pline makes slavish temper, and so leads to hypocrisy;, 
and where it is most successful, it breaks the mind, and 
then you have a low-spirited, moped creature, who how- 
ever with his unnatural sobriety he may please silly 
people, who commend tame, inactive children because 
they make no noise, nor give them any trouble, yet, at last, 
will probably prove as uncomfortable a thing to his 
friends, as he will be all his life a useless thing to him- 
self and others." "To avoid the danger that is on 
either hand, is the great art; and he that has found a 
way how to keep up a child's spirit easy, active, and 



92 JOHN LOCKE. 

free, and yet at the same tirue to restrain him from 
many things he has a mind to, and to draw him to 
things that are uneasy to him; he, I say, that knows 
how to reconcile these seeming contradictions, has, in my 
opinion, got the true secret of education." 

No corporal punishment, Locke tells us, is useful 
where the shame of suffering for having done amiss does 
not work more than the pain; otherwise, we merely 
teach boys to act from the worst motives of all — regard 
to bodily pleasure or pain. The tutor must be sparing 
In his correction, for it is his business to create a liking 
for learning, and *' children come to hate things which 
were at first acceptable to them, when they find them- 
selves whipped and chid and teazed about them. 
Offensive circumstances ordinarily infect innocent things 
which they are joined with, and the very sight of a cup 
wherein any one uses to take nauseous physic turns his 
stomach so that nothing will relish well out of it, though 
the cup be never so clean and well-shaped, and of the 
richest materials." From this, Locke would almost 
seem to agree with Comenius, that no punishment 
should be connected with learning. The notion may 
appear Utopian, but if boys could once be interested in 
their work it would not be found so.* 

In passing, I may observe that teachers of a kindly 

* Since I wrote the above, a remark from a schoolboy of more than 
average industry (or, perhaps I ought to say, of less than average lazi- 
ness) has rather shaken me in this opinion: "Somehow I can't get up 

work for Mr. : we never get anything if we don't." Both boys and 

grown people are apt to shrink from exertion where there is no must in 
the case, even though the exertion be not in itself distasteful to them. I 
^oubt, therefore, if a wise master would entirely give up compulsion, 
though he would never apply it to young children, or trust to it excliisively 
in the ease of older pupils. 



IDEAS OF DISCIPLINE. 93 

disposition are sometimes guilty of great cruelty, from 
neglecting the truth Locke dwells upon with such em- 
phasis, viz., that the mind will not act during any de- 
pression of the animal spirits. A boy fails to say his 
task, and he is kept in till he does: or he can not be 
made to understand some simple matter, and the teach- 
er's patience gets exhausted, when he has explained the 
thing again and again, and then can get no answer, or 
only an utterly absurd answer to the easiest question 
about it. Perhaps the boy is not a stupid boy, so the 
master accuses him of sullen inattention. The truth is, 
that the boy is frightened or dejected, and his mind no 
longer works at the command of the will. As Locke 
says, " It is impossible children should leam anything 
whilst their thoughts are possessed and disturbed with 
any passion, especially fear, which makes the strongest 
impression on their yet tender and weak spirits. Keep 
the mind in an easy, calm temper, when you would have 
it receive your instructions, or any increase of knowl- 
edge. It is as impossible to draw fair and regular char- 
acters on a trembling mind, as on a shaking paper." 
We all know, from our own experience, that when the 
mind is disturbed, or jaded, it no longer obeys the will, 
and yet in school-work we always consider the lads' 
mental power a constant quantity. Miss Davies well 
says: "Probably, if the truth were known, it would be 
found that injustice and unkindness are comparatively 
seldom caused by harshness of disposition. They are 
the result of an incapacity for imagining ourselves to be 
somebody else " ( " Higher Education of Women," 
p. 137). This I take to be especially true of the unkind- 
ness of schoolmasters. 



94 JOHN LOCKE. 

Rewards and punishments are largely employed in 
Locke's mode of education; but they are to be the re- 
words and punishments of the mind — esteem and dis- 
•grace. The sense of honor should be carefully culti- 
vated. Whatever commendation the child deserved 
should be bestowed openly; the blame should be in pri- 
vate. Flogging is to be reserved for stubbornness and 
obstinate disobedience. Locke concludes his advice on 
discipline by saying, that if the right course be taken 
with children, there will be not so much need of the appli- 
cation of the common rewards and punishments as usage 
has established. Children should not be too much 
checked. " The gamesome humor, which is wisely 
.adapted by nature to their age and temper, should 
rather be encouraged to keep up their spirits and to im- 
prove their strength and health, than curbed and 
restrained; and the chief art is to make all that they 
have to do, sport and play too." 

Locke's observations about manners and affectation 
have merely an historic interest. The dancing-master 
has a higher roU allotted him than he plays in our pres- 
*ent education. Locke writes: "Since nothing appears 
to me to give children so much becoming confidence and 
behavior, and so to raise them to the conversation of those 
.above their age, as dancing, I think they should be taught 
to dance as soon as they are capable of learning it. 
For though this consists only in outward gracefulness 
of motion, yet, I know not how, it gives children manly 
thoughts and carriage more than anything. But, other- 
"wise," he adds, " I would not have little children much 
tormented about punctilios, or niceties of breeding." 
Good company will teach them good manners. " Chil- 



MAKING STUDY PLEASURABLE. 95 

dren (nay, and men too) do most by example. We are 
all a sort of cameleons, that still take a tincture from 
things near us; nor is it to be wondered at in children, 
who better understand what they see than what they 
hear." 

When speaking of company, Locke points out the 
harm done by clownish or vicious servants. To avoid 
this, the children must be kept as much as possible in 
the*jcompany of their parents ; and by being allowed all 
proper freedom, must be led to take pleasure in it. 

Although I would go much farther than most school- 
masters in endeavoring to make the pupil's intellectual 
exertions pleasurable to him, I can not go all the way 
with Locke. His directions, though impracticable in a 
school, might, perhaps, be carried on by a private tutor 
— with, I should say, by no means satisfactory results. 
One employment Locke seems to think is, in itself, as 
pleasurable as another; so, if ^nothing which has to be 
learnt is made a burden, or imposed a task, the pupil 
will like work just as well as play. "Let a child be but 
ordered to whip his top at a certain time every day, 
whether he has, or has not, a mind to it; let this be but 
required of him as a duty wherein he must spend so 
many hours morning and afternoon, and see whether he 
will not be soon weary of any play at this rate." The 
tutor should, therefore, be on the watch for " seasons of 
aptitude and inclination,^'' and so " make learning as much 
a recreation to their play, as their play is recreation to 
their learning." Locke gives, however, two cautions, 
which might be found rather to clog the wheels of the 
chariot — ^first, the child is not to be allowed to grow idle; 
and secondly, the mind must be taught mastery over itself, 



96 JOHN LOCKE. 

" which will be an advantage of more consequence than 
Latin or logic, or most of those things children are usually 
required to learn." His scheme is no doubt an adraira- 
ble one, if it can be carried out with these qualifica- 
tions. 

As we have seen, Locke was opposed to any harshness 
about lessons, though much seems to have been used in 
schools of that period. " Why," asks Locke, " does the 
learning of Latin and Greek need the rod, when French 
and Italian need it not ? Children learn to dance and 
fence without whipping; nay, arithmetic, drawing, etc., 
they apply themselves well enough to without beating; 
which would make me suspect that there is something 
strange, unnatural, and disagreeable to that age, in the 
things required in grammar-schools, or in the meth- 
ods used there, that children can not be brought to with- 
out the severity of the lash, and hardly with that too; 
or else it is a mistake that tho'se tongues could not be 
taught them without beating." 

Instead of this harshness, Locke would use reasoning 
with children. " This," says he, " they understand as 
early as they do language; and, if I misobserve not, 
they love to be treated as rational creatures sooner than 
is imagined. It is a pride should be cherished in them, 
and as much as can be made an instrument to turn them 
by." 

In the necessary qualifications of the tutor, the first 
and principal, according to Locke, are breeding and 
knowledge of the world. " Courage, in an ill-bred man, 
has the air, and escapes not the opinion, of brutality. 
Leai-ning becomes pedantry; wit, buffoonery; plain- 
ness, rusticity; good-nature, fawning; and there can not 



THE WORK OF A TUTOR. 97 

be a good quality in him which want of breeding will 
not warp and disfigure to his disadvantage. By means 
of the tutor's knowledge of the world, Locke hoped to 
protect the pupil against the dangers which beset " an 
old boy, at his first appearance, with all the gravity of 
his ivy bush about him; " but he who is to steer a vessel 
over a difticult course, will hardly fit himself for the 
task by taking lessons even of the most skillful pilot, on 
shore. 

Locke's account of the work of a tutor gives so much 
insight into his notion of education generally, that it 
seems worth quoting at length: — 

" The great work of a governor is to fashion the car- 
riage and form the mind, to settle in his pupil good 
habits and the principles of virtue and wisdom, to give 
him, by little and little, of mankind, and work him into 
a love and imitation of what is excellent and praise- 
worthy; and, in the prosecution of it, to give him vigor, 
activity, and industry. The studies which he sets himself 
upon are but, as it were, the exercises of his faculties 
and employment of his time; to keep him from saunter- 
ing and idleness; to teach him application, and accustom 
him to take pains, and to give him some little taste of 
what his own industry must perfect. For who expects 
that under a tutor, a young gentleman should be an 
accomplished orator or logician ? go to the bottom of 
metaphysics, natural philosophy, or mathematics ? or 
be a master in history or chronology ? Though some- 
thing of each of these is to be taught him ; but it is only 
to open the door that he may look in and, as it were, 
begin an acquaintance, but not to dwell there; and a 
governor would be much blamed that should keep his 

F 



98 JOHN LOCKE. 

pupil too long, and lead him too far in most of them. 
But of good breeding, knowledge of the world, virtue, 
industry, and a love of reputation he can not have too 
much; and if he have these he will not long want what 
he needs or desires of the other. And since it can not 
be hoped that he should have time and strength to learn 
all things, most pains should be taken about that which 
is most necessary, and that principally looked after which 
will be of most and frequentest use to him in the 
world." 

It is curious to observe how little store Locke sets by 
learning. Indeed, it would seem that in those days 
school-learning was even more estranged from the busi- 
ness of life than it has been since. " A great part of 
the learning now in fashion in the schools of Europe," 
says Locke, " and that goes ordinarily into the round of 
education, a gentleman may, in good measure, be unfur- 
nished with, without any great disparagement to him- 
self, or prejudice to his affairs." Again he says, " We 
learn not to live, but to dispute, and our education fits 
us rather for the university than for the world. But it is 
no wonder, if those who make the fashion suit it to what 
they have, and not to what their pupils want.'"' This last re- 
mark is not without its application in our time. 

When we come to Locke's directions about teaching 
we find him carrying out his notion of combining amuse- 
ment with instruction. " Children should not have any- 
thing like work or serious laid on them; neither their 
minds nor bodies will bear it. It injures their healths; 
and their being forced and tied down to their books in 
an age at enmity wnth all such restraints has, I doubt 
not, been the reason why a great many have hated books 



LEARNING MADE AMUSING. 99 

and learniijg all their lives after. It is like a surfeit, 
that leaves an aversion behind that cannot be removed.'* 
I know a person of great quality (more yet to be honored 
for his learning and virtue than for his rank and high 
place), who by pasting on the six vowels (for in our lan- 
guage * y ' is one) on the six sides of a die, and the re- 
maining 18 consonants on the sides of three other 
dice, has made this a play for his children, that he shall 
win, who, at one cast, throws most words on these four 
dice, whereby his eldest son, yet in coats, ha>s played him- 
self into spelling with great eagerness, and without once 
having been chid for it, or forced to it." 

When the child has acquired reading, he should have 
some amusing book, such as ^sop and Reynard the 
Fox. Pictures of animals, with the names printed be- 
low them should be shown him from the time he knows 
his letters. He is to be encouraged to give an account 
of his reading. " Children," says Locke, " are commonly 
not taught to make any use of their reading, and so get to 
look upon books as " fashionable amusements or imperti- 
nent troubles, good for nothing." 

For religious instruction, the child should learn some 
easy Catechism, and should read some portions of Scrip- 
ture, but should not be allowed to read the whole 
Bible. 

When he begins to learn writing, he must be perfect 
in holding his pen, before paper is put before him: *' for 
not only children, but anybody else that would do any- 
thing well, should never be put upon too much of it at 
once, or be set to perfect themselves in two parts of an 
action at the same time, if they can possibly be sepa- 
rated." The child should then be given paper, on which 



100 JOHN LOCKE. 

is red-ink writing, in large hand. This writing he is to 
go over with black ink. 

He is next to learn drawing, '' a thing very useful to 
a gentleman on several occasions;" but in this, as in all 
other things not absolutely necessary, the rule holds 
good, " Nihil invita Minerva," [Nought unless Minerva 
wills]. 

He should now learn French. "People are accus- 
tomed to the right way of teaching that language, which 
is by talking it unto children in constant conversation, 
and not by grammatical rules. The Latin tongue might 
easily be taught in the same way." 

"Latin," says Locke, "I look upon as absolutely 
necessary to a gentleman." But he ridicules the folly 
of sending boys to grammar-schools, when they are in- 
tended for trade. "Yet, if you ask the parents why 
they do this, they think it as strange a question as if 
you should ask them why they go to church. Custom 
stands for reason; and has, to those who take it for 
reason, so consecrated the method, that it is almost re- 
ligiously observed by them, and they stick to it as if 
their children had scarce an orthodox education unless 
they learn Lily's Grammar." 

But, though Latin should be taught to gentlemen^ 
this should be done by conversation, and thus time 
might be gained for "several sciences: such as are a 
good part of geography, astronomy, chronology, anat- 
omy, besides some parts of history, and all other parts 
of knowledge of things that fall under the senses, and 
require little more than memory: for there, if we would 
take the true way, our knowledge should begin, and in 
those things should be laid the foundations; and not in 



INTERLINEAR TRANSLATION. 101 

the abstract Dotions of logic and metaphysics, which are 
fitter to amuse than inform the understanding in its first 
setting out toward knowledge." Again he says, " The 
learning of Latin being nothing but the learning of 
words, a very unpleasant business to both young and 
old, join as much other real knowledge* with it as you 
can, beginning still with that which lies most obvious to 
the senses; such as is the knowledge of minerals, plants, 
and animals; and particularly timber and fruit trees, 
their parts, and ways of propagation, wherein a great 
deal may be taught the child which will not be useless 
to the man: but more especially, geography, astronomy, 
and anatomy." He would also introduce some geom- 
etry. 

But Locke was not blind to the difficulty that few 
teachers would be found capable of talking Latin. 
He would, therefore, have the mother make a beginning 
by getting a Latin Testament with the quantities 
marked, and reading it with her children. He also sug- 
gests the use of interlinear translations. " Take," says 
he, " some easy and pleasant book, such as ^sop's 
Fables, and write the English translation (made as lit- 
eral as can be) in one line, and the Latin words which 
answer each of them, just over it in another. These let 
the child read every day, over and over again, till he 
perfectly understands the Latin, and then go on to 
another fable, till he be also perfect in that, not omit- 
ting what he is already perfect in, but sometimes re- 

* Real knowledge is here knowledge of things, as distinguished from 
all other knowleuge. Our loss of this meaning of the word real shows 
how small has been the influence of the Innovators in this country. Both 
the word and the party have been more successful in Germany. 



102 JOHN LOCKE. 

viewing that, to keep it in his memory. And when he 
comes to write, let these be set him for copies, which, 
with the exercise of his hand, will also advance hira in 
Latin. This being a more imperfect way than by talk- 
ing Latin imto him, the formation of the verbs first, and 
afterward the declension of the nouns and pronouns 
perfectly learned by heart, may facilitate his acquaint- 
ance with the genius and manner of the Latin tongue, 
which varies the signification of the verbs and nouna 
not, as the modern languages do, by particles prefixed, 
but by changing the last syllables. More than this of 
grammar I think he need not have till he can read him- 
self 'Sanctii Minerva,' with Scioppius and Perizonius' 
notes." It is no objection to his plan, he says, that 
children will learn merely by rote. Languages must be 
learned by rote, and used without any thought of gram- 
mar: "if grammar ought to be taught at any time, it 
must be to one that can speak the language already: 
how else can he be taught the grammar of it ? " 
" Grammar is, in fact, an introduction to rhetoric."* 
"I grant the grammar of a language is sometimes very 
carefully to be studied; but it is only to be studied by 
a grown man, when he applies himself to the under- 
standing of any language critically, which is seldom the 
business of any but professed scholars." "This, I think, 
will be agreed to, that if a gentleman be to study any 



* Much confusion has arisen, as Bishop Dupanloup has observed,^ 
from the double use of the word grammar; first, for the science of lan- 
guage, and second, for the mere statement of the facts of a language. 
Those who teach what is called " Latin Grammar " to children may argue 
that they only teach them, in order and connection, facts which they 
would otherwise have to pick up at random. See also M. Arnold r 
Schools, etc., p. 83. 



one's vernacular first. 103 

language, it ought to be that of his own country, that 
he may understand the language which he has constant 
use of, with the utmost accuracy." And yet '* young 
gentlemen are forced to learn the grammars of foreign 
and dead languages, and are never once told of the 
grammar of their own tongue; they do not so much as 
know that there is any such thing, much less is it made 
their business to be instructed in it. Nor is their own 
language ever proposed to them as worthy their care 
and cultivating, though they have daily use of it, and 
are not seldom, in the future course of their lives, 
judged of by their handsome or awkward way of ex- 
pressing themselves in it. Whereas the languages 
whose grammars they have been so much employed in, 
are such as probably they shall scarce ever speak or 
write; or if, upon occasion, this should happen, they 
should be excused for the mistakes and faults they make 
in it. Would not a Chinese, who took notice of this 
way of breeding, be apt to imagine that all our young 
gentlemen were designed to be teachers and professors 
of the dead languages of foreign countries, and not to 
be men of business in their own ? " 

Locke grants that in some sciences where their reasons 
are to be exercised, difficulties may be proposed, on pur- 
pose to excite industry, and accustom the mind to em- 
ploy its own strength and sagacity in solving them. 
" But yet," he continues, " I guess this is not to be done 
to children whilst very young, nor at their entrance 
upon any sort of knowledge. Then everything of itself 
is difficult, and the great use and skill of a teacher is to 
make all as easy as he can." 

Locke inveighs strongly against the ordinary practice 



104 JOHN LOCKE. 

of writing themes on such subjects as ^''omnia vmcit amor^^^ 
[Love conquers ail things], or " Non licet in hello his pec- 
ca/re^'' [In war one has no chance to blunder twice]. 
" Here the poor lad who wants knowledge of those 
things he is to speak of, which is to be had only from 
time and observation, must set his invention on the rack 
to say something where he knows nothing, which is a 
sort of Egyptian tyranny, to bid them make bricks who 
have not yet any of the materials." Verse-making 
found equally little favor in his eyes. 

He denounces also the practice of making boys say 
large portions of authors by heart, to strengthen the 
memory. He thinks that "the learning pages of Latin 
by heart no more fits the memory for retention of any- 
thing else than the graving of one sentence in lead 
makes it the more capable of retaining any other char- 
acters. If such a sort of exercise of the memory were 
to give it strength, and improve our parts, players, of 
all other people, must needs have the best memories, and 
be the best company.* " What the mind is intent upon 
and careful of, that it remembers best; to which, if 
method and order be joined, all is done, I think, that 
can be for the help of a weak memory; and he that will 
take any other way to do it, especially that of charging 
it with a train of other people's words, which he that 
learns cares not for, will, I guess, scarce find the profit 
answer half the time and pains employed in it." Boys, 
however, should learn by heart passages which are valu- 
able in themselves, and these they should give an account 

* From the little I have seen of gentlemen of this profession, I am by 
no means disposed to consider this, as Locke does apparently, a reditc- 
tio ad absurdum, [proof of the opposite view from the absurdity of this in- 
ference]. 



EXERCISES IN ENGLISH. 105 

of, and repeat again and again, that they may always 
remember them, and may also be taught to reflect on 
what they learn. 

As an exercise in English, " there should be proposed 
to young gentlemen rational and useful questions suited 
to their age and capacities, and on subjects not wholly 
unknown to them, nor out of their way. Such as these, 
when they are ripe for exercises of this nature, they 
should extempore [without preparation], or after a little 
meditation upon the spot, speak to, without penning of 
anything." Even at an earlier age children should often 
tell a story of anything they know, such as a fable from 
^sop ("the only book almost that I know fit for chil- 
dren "), and at first the teacher is to correct only the 
most remarkable fault they are guilty of in their way of 
putting it together. They must also write narratives, 
and, when more advanced, letters. " They must also 
read those things that are well writ in English, to per- 
fect their style in the purity of our language; for since it 
is English that an English gentleman will have constant 
iise of, that is the language he should chiefly culti- 
vate, and wherein most care should be taken to polish 
and perfect his style." 

On another point he was at variance with the custom 
of his day. " If the use and end of right reasoning," he 
says, "be to have right notions and a right judg- 
ment of things, to distinguish between truth and false- 
hood, right and wrong, and to act accordingly, be sure 
not to let your son be bred up in the art and formality 
of disputing, either practicing it himself or admiring it 
in others." Of logic and rhetoric he also speaks very 
disparagingly. 



106 JOHN LOCKE. 

To the studies already mentioned, viz., geography, 
chronology, history, astronomy, anatomy, Locke would 
add the principles of civil law and the laws of England. 

" Natural philosophy, as a speculative science," writes 
Locke, "I imagine we have none; and perhaps I may 
think I have reason to say we never shall be able to 
niake a science of it. The works of nature are contrived 
by a Wisdom and operate by ways too far surpassing 
our faculties to discover, or capacities to conceive, for 
us ever to be able to reduce them to a science." He 
allows, however, that the incomparable Mr. Newton has 
shown how far mathematics, applied to some parts of 
Nature, may, upon principles that matter of fact justi- 
fies, carry us in the knowledge of some, as I may call 
them, particular provinces of the incomprehensible uni- 
verse." 

Greek does not enter into Locke's curriculum. Latin 
and French, "as the world now goes," are required of a 
gentleman, but Greek only of a professed scholar. If 
the pupil has a mind to carry his studies further for him- 
self, he can do so; but, as it is, "how many are there of 
a hundred, even amongst scholars themselves, who retain 
the Greek they carried from school; or ever improve it 
to a familiar, ready, and perfect understanding of Greek 
authors ? " The tutor must remember " that his business 
is not so much to teach the pupil all that is knowable, as 
to raise in him a love and esteem of knowledge, and to 
put him in the right way of knowing and improving 
himself when he has a mind to it." 

In the matter of accomplishments, Locke is rather 
hard upon music, " which leads into jovial company," 
and painting, which is a sedentary, aud therefore not a 



THE FINISHED GENTLEMAN. 107 

healthy occupation. Wrestling he prefers to fencing.- 
" Riding the great horse " (whatever that may mean) 
should not be made a business of. 

By all means let a gentleman learn at least one 
manual trade, especially such as can be practiced in 
the open air. This will make his leisure pleasant to him, 
and will keep him from useless and dangerous pastimes. 

From the last part of education — travel — Locke thinks 
more harm is commonly derived than good: not that 
travel is bad in itself, but the time usually chosen, viz., 
from sixteen to twenty-one, is the worst time of all. 

This short review of the '' Thoughts on Education,'* 
shows us that Locke's aim was to give a boy a robust 
mind in a robust body. His body was to endure hard- 
ness, his reason was to teach him self denial. But this 
result was to be brought about by leading, not driving 
him. He was to be trained, not for the University, but 
for the world. Good principles, good manners, and dis- 
cretion were to be cared for first of all; intelligence and 
intellectual activity next, and actual knowledge last of 
all. His spirits were to be kept up by kind treatment, 
and learning was never to be made a drudgery. With 
regard to the subjects of instruction, those branches of 
knowledge which concern things were to take pre- 
cedence of those which consist of abstract ideas. The 
prevalent drill in the grammar of the classical languages 
was to be abandoned. The mother-tongue was to be 
carefully studied, and other languages acquired either 
by conversation, or by the use of translations. In every- 
thing, the part the pupil was to play in life was steadily 
to be kept in view; and the ideal which Locke proposed 
was not the finished scholar, but the finished gentleman.. 



VI. 

ROUSSEAU'S " EMILE." 

In education, as in politics, no school of thinkers has 
succeeded, or can succeed, in engrossing all truth to 
itself. No party, no individual even, can take up a cen- 
tral position between the Conservatives and Radicals, 
and judging everything on its own merits, try to preserve 
that only which is worth preserving, and to destroy just 
that which is worth destroying. Nor do we find that 
judicial minds often exercise the greatest influence in 
these matters. The only force which can overcome the 
vis inertia [power of inertionj ot" use and wont is enthusi- 
asm; and this, springing from the discovery of new 
truths and hatred of old abuses, can hardly exist with 
due respect for truth that has become commonplace, and 
usage which is easily confounded with corruptions that 
disfigure it. So advances are made somewhat after this 
manner: the reformer, urged on by his enthusiasm, 
attacks use and wont with more spirit than discretion, 
Those who are wedded to things as they are, try to 
draw attenti<m from the weak points of their system, to 
the mistakes or extravagances of the reformer. In the 
«nd, both sides are benefited by the encounter, and 
when their successors carry on the contest, they differ as 
much from those whose causes they espouse as from each 
other. 



ORIGIN OF " EMILE." 109 

In this way we have already made great progress^ 
Compare, for instance, our present teaching of gram- 
mar with the ancient method; and our short and broken 
school-time with the old plan of keeping boys in for five 
consecutive hours twice a day. Our Conservatives and 
Reformers are not so much at variance as their prede- 
cessors. To convince ourselves of this we have only to 
consider the state of parties in the second half of the 
last century. On the one side we find the schoolmasters 
who turned out the courtiers of Louis XV. ; on the other, 
the most extravagant, the most eloquent, the most reck- 
less of innovators — J. J. Rousseau. 

Rousseau has told us that he resolved on having fixed 
principles by the time he was forty years old. Among 
the principles of which he accordingly laid in a stocky 
were these: 1st, Man, as he might be, is perfectly good; 
2d, Man, as he is, is utterly bad. To maintain these 
opinions, Rousseau undertook to show, not only the rot- 
ten state of the existing society, which he did with nota- 
able success, but also the proper method of rearing 
children so as to make them all that they ought to be — 
an attempt at construction which v^^as far more difiicult 
and hazardous than his phillipics. 

This was the origin of the " Emile," perhaps the most 
influential book ever written on the subject of education. 
The school to which Rousseau belonged may be said, 
indeed, to have been founded by Montaigne, and to have 
met with a champion, though not a very enthusiastic cham- 
pion, in Locke. But it was reserved for Rousseau to give 
this theory of education its complete development, and 
to expound it in the clearest and most eloquent language. 
In the form in which Rousseau left it, the theory greatly 



no 

influenced Basedow and Pestalozzi, and still influences 
many educational reformers who differ from Rousseau as 
much as our schoolmasters differ from those of Louis XY 

Of course as man was corrupted by ordinary educa- 
tion, the ideal education must differ from it in every 
respect. " Take the road directly opposite to that which 
is in use, and you will almost always do right." This 
svas the fundamental maxim. So thorough a radical was 
Rousseau, that he scorned the idea of half -measures. "I 
had rather follow the established practice entirely," says 
he, **than adopt a good one by halves." 

In the society of that time everything was artificial? 
Rousseau therefore demanded a return to Nature. 
Parents should do their duty in rearing their own off- 
spring. " Where there is no mother, there can be no 
child." The father should find time to bring up the 
child whom the mother has suckled. No duty can be 
more important than this. But although Rousseau 
seems conscious that family life is the natural state, he 
makes his model child an orphan, and hands him over to 
a governor, to be brought up in the country without 
i3ompanions. 

This governor is to devote himself, for some years, 
.entirely to imparting to his pupil these difiicult arts — 
the art of being ignorant and of losing time. Till he is 
twelve years old, Emile is to have no direct instruction 
whatever. *'At that age he shall not know what a book 
is," says Rousseau; though elsewhere we are told that 
he will learn to read of his own accord by the time he is 
ten, if no attempt is made to teach him. He is to be 
Tinder no restraint, and is to do nothing but what he 
^ees to be useful. 



IGNORANCE CULTIVATED. Ill 

Freedom from restraint is, however, to be apparent, 
not real. As in ordinary education the child employs 
all its faculties in duping the master, so in education 
*^ according to Nature," the master is to devote himself 
to duping the child. "Let him always be his own mas- 
ter in appearance, and do you take care to be so in reality. 
There is no subjection so complete as that which pre- 
serves the appearance of liberty; it is by this means 
even the will is led captive." 

"The most critical interval of human nature is that 
between the hour of our birth and twelve years of 
age. This is the time, wherein vice and error take root 
without our being possessed of any instrument to destroy 
them." 

Throughout this season, the governor is to be at work 
inculcating the art of being ignorant and losing time. 
"This first part of education ought to be purely negative. 
It consists neither in teaching virtue nor truth, but in 
guarding the heart from vice and the mind from error. 
If you could do nothing and let nothing be done; if you 
could bring up your pupil healthy and robust to the age 
of twelve years, without his being able to distinguish 
his right hand from his left, the eyes of his understand- 
ing would be open to reason at your first lesson; void 
both of habit and prejudice, he would have nothing in 
him to operate against your endeavors; soon under your 
instruction he would become the wisest of men. Thus, 
by setting out with doing nothing, you would produce a 
prodigy of education." 

" Exercise his body, his senses, faculties, powers, but 
keep his mind inactive as long as possible. Distrust all 
the sentiments he acquires, previous to the judgment 



112 Rousseau's "emile." 

which should enable him to scrutinize them. Prevent 
x)r restrain all foreign impressions; and in order to hin- 
der the rise of evil, be not in too great a hurry to instill 
good; for it is only such when the mind is enlightened 
by reason. Look upon every delay as an advantage: 
it is gaining a great deal to advance without losing any- 
thing. Let childhood ripen in children. In short, 
whatever lesson becomes necessary for them to take care 
not to give them to-day, if it may be deferred without 
danger till to-morrow." 

*' Do not, then, alarm yourself much about this appar- 
ent idleness. What would you say of the man, who, in 
order to make the most of life, should determine never 
to go to sleep ? You would say, The man is mad: he is 
not enjoying the time; he is depriving himself of it: to 
avoid sleep he is hurrying toward death. Consider, then, 
that it is the same here, and that childhood is the sleep 
of reason." 

Such is the groundwork of Rousseau's educational 
scheme. His ideal boy, of twelve years old, is to be a 
thoroughly well-developed animal, with every bodily 
sense trained to its highest perfection. " His ideas," says 
Rousseau, " are confined, but clear; he knows nothing 
by rote, but a great deal by experience. If he reads less 
well than another child in our books, he reads better in 
the book of nature. His understanding does not lie in 
his tongue, but in his brain ; he has less memory than 
judgment; he can speak only one language, but then he 
understands what he says; and although he may not 
talk of things so well as others, he will do them much 
better. He knows nothing at all of custom, fashion, or 
habit; what he did yesterday has no influence on what 



THE MODEL BOY. 113 

he is to do to-day; he follows no formula, is influenced 
by no authority or example, but acts and speaks just as 
it suits him. Do not, then, expect from him set dis- 
courses or studied manners, but always the faithful ex- 
pression of his ideas, and the conduct which springs 
naturally from his inclinations." Furthermore, this 
model child looks upon all men as equal, and will ask 
assistance from a king as readily as from a foot-boy. He 
does not understand what a command is, but will readily 
do anything for another person, in order to place that 
person under an obligation, and so increase his own 
rights. He knows also no distinction between work and 
play. As a climax to this list of wonders, I may add 
that his imagination has remained inactive, and he only 
sees what is true in reality. 

The reader will probably have concluded, by this 
time, that no child can possibly be so educated as to 
resemble Emile, and, perhaps, further, that no wise 
father would so educate his son if it were possible. A 
child who does not understand what a command is, and 
who can be induced to do anything for another only by 
the prospect of laying that person under an obligation; 
who has no habits, and is guided merely by his inclina- 
tions — such a child as this is, fortunately, nothing but a 
dream of Rousseau's. 

But fantastical as Rousseau often is, the reader of his 
" Emile " is struck again and again, not more by the 
charm of his language than by his insight into child- 
nature, and the wisdom of his remarks upon it. 

The " Emile " is a large work, and the latter part is 
interesting rather from a literary and philosophical 
point of view, than as it is connected with education. 

G 



114 ROFSSEAU'S "EMILE." 

I purpose, therefore, coofining my attention to the 
earlier portion of the book, and giving some of the 
passages, of which a great deal since said and written 
on education has been a comparatively insipid decoction. 

**A11 thiugs are good, as their Creator made them, 
but everything degenerates in the hands of man." 
These are the first words of the " Emile," and the key- 
note of Rousseau's philosophy. 

"We are born weak, we have need of strength; we 
are born destitute of everything, we have need of assis- 
tance; we are born stupid, we have need of understand- 
ing. All that we are not possessed of at our birth, and 
which we require when grown up, is bestowed on us by 
education. 

" This education we receive from nature, from men, 
or from things. The internal development of our 
organs and faculties is the education of nature; the use 
we are taught to make of that development is the edu- 
cation given us by men; and in the acquisitions made 
by our own experience on the objects that surround us, 
consists our education from things." "Since the con- 
currence of these three kinds of education is necessary 
to their perfection, it is by that one which is entirely 
independent of us, we must regulate the two others." 

Now " to live is not merely to breathe; it is to act, it 
is to make use of our organs, our senses, our faculties, 
and of all of those parts of ourselves which give us the 
feeling of our existence. The man who has lived most, 
is not he who has counted the greatest number of years, 
but he who has most thoroughly felt life." 

The aim of education, then, must be complete living. 

But ordinary education (and here for a moment I am 



CHILDHOOD SACRIFICED. 115 

expressiDg my own conviction, and not simply reporting 
Rousseau), instead of seeking to develop the life of the 
child, sacrifices childhood to the acquirement of knowl- 
edge, or rather the semblance of knowledge, which it is 
thought will prove useful to the youth, or the man. 
Rousseau's great merit lies in his having exposed this 
fundamental error. He says, very truly, "People do 
not understand childhood. With the false notions we 
have of it, the further we go the more we blunder. 
The wisest apply themselves to what it is important to 
men to know, without considering what children are in a 
condition to learn. They are always seeking the man in 
the child, without reflecting what he is before he can be 
a man. This is the study to which I have applied my- 
self most; so that, should my practical scheme be found 
useless and chimerical, my observation will always turn 
to account. I may possibly have taken a very bad view 
of what ought to be done, but I conceive I have taken 
a good one of the subject to be wrought upon. Begin 
then by studying your pupils better; for most assuredly 
you do not at present understand them. So if you read 
my book with that view, I do not think it will be useless 
to you." "Nature requires children to be children 
before they are men. If we will pervert this order, we 
shall produce forward fruits, having neither ripeness nor 
taste, and sure soon to become rotten; we shall have 
young professors and old children. Childhood has its 
manner of seeing, perceiving, and thinking, peculiar to 
itself; nothing is more absurd than our being anxious to 
substitute our own in its stead." " We never know how 
to put ourselves in the place of children; we do not 
enter into their ideas, we lend them our own: and fol- 



116 Rousseau's '^emile." 

lowing always our own train of thought, we fill their 
heads, even while we are discussing incontestible truths, 
with extravagance and error." " I wish some judicious 
hand would give us a treatise on the art of studying 
children; an art of the greatest importance to under- 
stand, though fathers and preceptors know not as yet 
even the elements of it." 

The governor, then, must be able to sympathize with 
his pupil, and, on this account, Rousseau requires that 
he should be young. " The governor of a child should be 
young, even as young as possible, consistent with his 
having obtained necessary discretion and sagacity. I 
would have hira be himself a child, that he might be- 
come the companion of his pupil, and gain his confi- 
dence by partaking of his amusements. There are not 
things enough in common between childhood and man- 
hood, to form a solid attachment at so great a distance. 
Children sometimes caress old men, but they never love 
them." * 

The governor's functions are threefold: 1st, that of 
keeping off hurtful influences — no light task in Rous- 
seau's eyes, as he regarded almost every influence from 
the child's fellow-creatures as hurtful; 2d that of devel- 
oping the bodily powers, especially the senses; 3d, that 
of communicating the one science for children — moral 
behavior. In all these, even in the last, he must be gov- 

* Here, and in some other instances, I have selected as characteristic 
of their author, opinions which I believe to be totally erroneous. The 
distance between the child and the man is no doubt very great (so great, 
indeed, that the distance between the young man and the old bears no ap- 
preciable ratio to it) : but this does not preclude the most intense affection 
of the young toward grown persons of any age, as our individual experi- 
ence has probably convinced us. Perhaps the old have more in common 
with children than those have who are in the full vigor of manhood. 



OBJECT-LESSONS. 117 

^rnor rather than preceptor, Jor it is less his province to 
instruct than to conduct. He must not lay down pre- 
cepts, but teach his pupil to discover them. "I preach 
a difficult art," says Rousseau, " the art of guiding with- 
out precepts, and of doing everything by doing nothing." 

The most distinctive characteristic of childhood is vital- 
ity. "In the heart of the old man the failing energies 
concentrate themselves: in that of the child, they over- 
flow and spread outward; he is conscious of life enough 
to animate all that surrounds him. Whether he makes 
or mars, it is all one to him; he is satisfied with having 
changed the state of things; and every change is an 
action. This vitality is to be allowed free scope. Swad- 
dling-clothes are to be removed from infants; the 
restraints of school and book-learning from children. 
Their love of action is to be freely indulged.* 

The nearest approach to teaching which Rousseau 
permitted, was that which became afterward, in the 
hands of Pestalozzi, the system of object-lessons. "As 
soon as a child begins to distinguish objects, a proper 
choice should be made in those which are presented to 
him." He must learn to feel heat and cold, the hard- 
ness, softness, and weight of bodies; to judge of their 
magnitude, figure, and other sensible qualities, by look- 



*Lord Stanley, than whom no man can be more " practical," follows 
Rousseau in this particular. " People are beginning to find out, what, if 
they would use their own observation more, and not follow one another 
like sheep, they would have found out long ago, that it is doing positive 
harm to a young child, mental and bodily harm, to keep it learning, or 
pretending to learn, the greater part of the day. Nature says to a child, 
'Run about,' the schoolmaster says, 'Sit still;' and as the schoolmaster 
can punish on the spot, and Nature only long afterward, he is obeyed, and 
health and brain suffer."— Speech reported in the "Evening Mail," De- 
cember 9, 1864. 



118 ROFSSEAU'S ''eMILE." 

ing, touching, hearing, and. particularly by comparing 
the sight with the touch, and judging, by means of the 
eye, of the sensation acquired by the fingers." These 
exercises should be continued through childhood. " A 
child has neither the strength nor the judgment of a man; 
but he is capable of feeling and hearing as well, or at 
least nearly so. His palate also is as sensible, though 
less delicate: and he distinguishes odors as well, though 
not with the same nicety. Of all our faculties, the 
senses are perfected the first: these, therefore, are the 
first we should cultivate; they are, nevertheless, the only 
ones that are usually forgotten, or the most neglected." 
" Observe a cat, the first time she comes into a room; 
she looks and smells about; she is not easy a moment: 
she distrusts everything till everything is examined and 
known. In the same manner does a child examine into- 
everything, when he begins to walk about, and enters, if 
I may so say, the apartment of the world. All the dif- 
ference is, that the sight, which is common to both the 
child and the cat, is in the first assisted by the feeling of 
the hands, and in the latter by the exquisite scent which 
nature has bestowed on it. It is the right or wrong culti- 
vation of this inquisitive disposition that makes children 
either stupid or expert; sprightly or dull, sensible or fool- 
ish. The primary impulses of man urge him to compare 
his forces with those of the objects about him, and to dis- 
cover the sensible qualities of such objects as far as they 
relate to him; his first study is a sort of experimental 
philosophy relative to self-preservation, from which it is^ 
the custom to divert him by speculative studies before he 
has found his place on this earth. During the time that 
his supple and delicate organs can adjust themselves to 



EDUCATION OF THE SENSES. 119 

the bodies on which they should act, while his senses 
are as yet exempt from illusions, this is the time to ex- 
ercise both the one and the other in their proper func- 
tions; this is the time to learn the sensuous relations 
which things have with us. As everything that enters 
the human understanding is introduced by the senses; 
the first reason in man is a sensitive reason ; and this 
serves as the basis of his intellectual reason. Our first 
instructors in philosophy are our feet, hands, and eyes. 
Substituting books for all this is not teaching us to 
reason, but teaching us to use the reasoning of others; it 
is teaching us to believe a great deal, and never to know 
anything." "To exercise any art, we must begin by 
procuring the necessary implements; and to employ those 
implements to any good purpose, they should be made 
sufficiently solid for their intended use. To learn to 
think, therefore, we should exercise our limbs and our 
organs, which are the instruments of our intelligence; 
and in order to make the best use of those instruments, 
it is necessary that the body furnishing them should be 
robust and hearty. Thus, so far is a sound understand- 
ing from being independent of the body, that it is owing 
to a good constitution that the operations of the mind are 
effected with facility and certainty." " To exercise the 
senses is not merely to make use of them; it is to learn 
rightly to judge by them ; to learn, if I mayso express my- 
self, to perceive; for we know how to touch, to see, to 
hear, only as we have learned. Some exercises are purely 
natural and mechanical, and serve to make the body 
strong and robust, without taking the least hold on the 
judgment: such are those of swimming, running, leap- 
ing, whipping a top, throwing stones, etc. All these are 



120 

very well : but have we only arms and legs ? Have we 
not also eyes and ears; and are not these organs neces- 
sary to the expert use of the former? Exercise, therefore, 
not only the strength, but also all the senses that direct 
it; make the best possible use of each, and let the im- 
pressions of one confirm those of another. Measure, 
reckon, weigh, compare." 

According to the present system, "The lessons which 
school-boys learn of each other in playing about their 
bounds, are a hundred times more useful to them than 
all those which the master teaches in the school." 

He also suggests experiments in the dark, which will 
both train the senses and get over the child's dread of 
darkness. ^^Ab assuetis non Jit passio,''^ [Passion does not 
arise from things accustomed]. 

Emile, living in the country and being much in the 
open air, will acquire a distinct and emphatic way of 
speaking. He will also avoid a fruitful source of bad 
pronunciation among the children of the rich, viz., say- 
ing lessons by heart. These lessons the children gabble 
when they are learning them, and afterward, in their 
efforts to remember the words, they drawl, and give all 
kinds of false emphasis. Declamation is to be shunned 
as acting. If Emile does not understand anything, he 
will be too wise to pretend to understand it. 

Rousseau seems perhaps inconsistent, in not excluding 
music and drawing from his curriculum of ignorance: 
but as a musician, he naturally relaxed toward the 
former;* and drawing he would have his pupil culti- 

♦ The followers of the Tonic Sol-Fa system have in Rousseau a strong 
ally in attacking the method which makes Do the tonic of the natural key 
only. 



WORDS, WORDS, AVORDS. 121 

vate, not for the sake ol" the art itself, but only to give 
him a good eye and supple hand. He should, in all 
cases, draw from the objects themselves, "my intention 
being, not so much that he should know how to imi- 
tate the objects, as to become fully acquainted with 
them." 

The instruction given to ordinary school-boys, was of 
course an abomination in the eyes of Rousseau. "All 
the studies imposed on these poor unfortunates tend to 
such objects as are entirely foreign to their minds. 
Judge, then, of the attention they are likely to bestow 
on them." The pedagogues, who make a great parade 
of the instructions they give their scholars, are paid to 
talk in a different strain: one may see plainly, however, 
by their conduct, that they are exactly of my opinion: 
for, after all, what is it they teach them? Words, still 
words,and nothing but words. Among the various sciences 
they pretend to teach, they take particular care not to 
fall upon those which are really useful; because there 
would be the sciences of things, and in them they would 
never succeed; but they fix on such as appear to be un- 
derstood when their terms are once gotten by rote, viz., 
geography, chronology, heraldry, the languages, etc., all 
studies so foreign to the purposes of man, and particu- 
larly to those of a child, that it is a wonder if ever he 
may have occasion for them as long as he lives. *' In 
any study whatever, unless we possess the ideas of the 
things represented, the signs representing them are 
of no use or consequence. A child is, nevertheless, 
always confined to these signs, without our being capable 
of making him comprehend any of the things which 
they represent." What is the world to a child ? It is 



122 

a globe of pasteboard.* "As no science consists in the 
knowledge of words, so there is no study proper for 
children. As they have no certain ideas, so they have 
no real memory; for I do not call that so which is 
retentive only of mere sensations What signifies im- 
printing on their minds a catalogue of signs which to 
them represent nothing ? Is it to be feared that, in 
acquiring the knowledge of things, they will not acquire 
also that of signs ? Why, then, shall we put them to the 
unnecessary trouble of learning them twice ? And yet 
what dangerous prejudices do we not begin to instill^ 
by making them take for knowledge, words which to 
them are without meaning ? In the very first unintel' 
ligible sentence with which a child sits down satisfied* 
in the very first thing he takes upon trust, or learns from 
others without being himself convinced of its utility, he 
loses part of his understanding; and he may figure long 
in the eyes of fools before he will be able to repair so 
considerable a loss. No; if nature has given to the 
child's brain that pliability which renders it fit to receive 
all impressons, it is not with a view that we should im- 
print thereon the names of king,«, dates, terms of her- 
aldry, of astronomy, of geography, and all those words^ 
meaningless at his age, and useless at any age, with 
which we weary his sad and sterile childhood; but that 
all the ideas which he can conceive, and which are use- 
ful to him, all those which relate to his happiness, and 
will one day make his duty plain to him, may trace 

* Rousseau, like his pupil Basedow, would avoid the use even of repre- 
sentations, where possible. "It ought to be laid down as a general rule, 
never to substitute the shadow unless where it is impossible to exhibit the 
substance ; for the representation engrossing the attention of the child^ 
generally makes him forget the object represented." 



WHAT CHILDEEN SHOULD BE TAUGHT. 123 

themselves there in characters never to be effaced, and 
may assist him in conducting himself through life in a 
manner appropriate to his nature and his faculties." 
''That kind of memory which is possessed by children, 
may be fully employed without setting them to study 
books. Everything they see, or hear, appears striking* 
and they commit it to memory. A child keeps in his 
mind a register of the actions and conversation of those 
who are about him; every scene he is engaged in is a 
book from which he insensibly enriches his memory^ 
treasuring up his store till time shall ripen his judgment 
and turn it to profit. In the choice of these scenes and 
objects, in the care of presenting those constantly to his 
view which he ought to be familiar with, and in hiding 
from him such as are improper, consists the true art of 
cultivating this primary faculty of a child. By such 
means, also, it is, that we should endeavor to form that 
magazine of knowledge which should serve for his edu- 
cation in youth, and to regulate his conduct afterward.. 
This method, it is true, is not productive of little prodi- 
gies of learning, nor does it tend to the glorification of 
the governess or preceptor; but it is the way to form 
robvist and judicious men, persons sound in body and 
mind, who, without being admired while children, 
know how to make themselves respected when grown 
up." 

As for reading and writing, if you can induce a desire 
for them, the child will be sure to learn them. '' I am 
almost certain that Emile will know perfectly well 
how to read and write before he is ten years old,, 
because I give myself very little trouble whether he 
learn it or not before he is fifteen; but I had much 



124 Rousseau's "emile." 

rather be should never learn to read at all, than to ac- 
quire that knowledge at the expense of everything that 
would render it useful -to him; and of what service will 
the power of reading be to him when he has renounced 
its use forever ? " 

The following passage is perhaps familiar to Mr. 
Lowe: " If, proceeding on the plan I have begun to 
delineate, you follow rules directly contrary to those 
w^hich are generally received; if, instead of transporting 
your pupil's mind to what is remote — if, instead of 
making his thoughts wander unceasingly in other places, 
in other climates, in other centuries, to the ends of the 
earth, and to the very heavens, you apply yourself to 
keeping him always at home and attentive to that which 
comes in immediate contact with him, you will then find 
him capable of perception, of memory, and even of rea- 
son: this is the order of nature. In proportion as the 
sensitive becomes an active being, he acquires a dis- 
cernment proportional to his bodily powers; when he 
possesses more of the latter, also, than are necessary for 
his preservation, it is with that redundancy, and not be- 
fore, that he displays those speculative faculties which 
are adapted to the employment of such abilities to other 
purposes. Are you desirous, therefore, to cultivate the 
understanding of your pupil ? cultivate those abilities 
on which it depends. Keep him in constant exercise of 
body; bring him up robust and healthy, in order to 
make him reasonable and wise; let him work, let him 
run about, let him make a noise, in a word, let him 
be always active and in motion; let him be once a man 
in vigor, and he will soon be a man in understanding." 

Let us now examine what provision was made, in 



MORAL INSTRUCTION. 125 

Rousseau's system, for teaching the one science for 
children, that of moral behavior [dea devoirs de Vhomme). 
His notions of this science were by no means those to 
which we are accustomed. As a believer in the good- 
ness of human nature, he traced all folly, vanity, and 
vice to ordinary education, and he would therefore de- 
part as widely as possible from the usual course. " Ex- 
amine the rules of the common method of education," 
he writes, " and you will find them all wrong, particu- 
larly those which relate to virtue and manners." 

A simple alteration of method, however, would not 
suffice. Rousseau went further than this. He discarded 
all received notions of goodness, and set up one of his 
own in their stead. " The only lesson of morality proper 
for children, and the most important to persons of all 
ages, is never to do an injury to any one. Even the 
positive precept of doing good, if not made subordinate 
to this, is dangerous, false, and contradictory. Who is 
there that does not do good ? All the world does good, 
the wicked man as well as others: he makes one person 
happy at the expense of making a hundred miserable; 
hence arise all our calamities. The most sublime vir- 
tues are negative; they are also the most difficult to put 
in practice, because they are attended with no ostentation, 
and are even above the pleasure, so sweet to the heart of 
man, of sending away others satisfied with our benevo- 
lence. O how much good must that man necessarily do 
his fellow-creatures, if such a man there be, who never 
did any of them harm ! What intrepidity of soul, what 
constancy of mind are necessary here ! It is not, how- 
ever, by reasoning on this maxim, but by endeavoring 
to put it in practice, that all its difficulty is to be dis- 



126 Rousseau's "emile." 

-covered." *' The precept of never doing another harm^ 
implies that of having as little to do as possible with 
human society; for in the social state the good of one 
man necessarily becomes the evil of another. This rela- 
tion is essential to the thing itself, and can not be 
-changed. We may inquire, on this principle, which is 
best, man in a state of society or in a state of solitude ? " 
"A certain noble autlior has said, none but a wicked man 
might exist alone: for my part, I say, none but a good 
man might exist alone." 

This passage fully explains Rousseau's enthusiasm for 
Robinson Crusoe, for he must have regarded him as the 
best and most beneficent of mortals. " Happy are the 
people among whom goodness requires no self-denial, 
and men may be just without virtue." And the fortu- 
nate solitary had one-half of goodness ready made for 
him. " That which renders man essentially good, is to 
have few wants, and. seldom to compare himself with 
others; that which renders him essentially wicked, is to 
have many wants, and to be frequently governed by 
opinion." Rousseau, however, did not vaunt the merits 
of negation with absolute consistency. Elsewhere he 
says, "He who wants nothing will love nothing, and I 
can not conceive that he who loves nothing can be 
happy." 

As Rousseau found the root of all evil in the action of 
man upon man, he sought to dissever his child of nature 
as much as possible from his fellow creatures, and to 
:assimilate him to Robinson Crusoe. Anything like rule 
.and obedience was abomination to Rousseau, and he 
-confounds the wise rule of superior intelligence with 
the tyranny of mere caprice. He writes: " We always 



IDEAS OF LIBERTY. 127 

either do that which is pleasing to the child, or exact of 
him what pleases ourselves: either submitting to his 
humors or obliging him to submit to ours. There is no 
medium, he must either give orders or receive them 
Hence the first ideas it acquires are those of absolute 
rule and servitude." The great panacea for all evils was, 
then, "liberty," by which Rousseau understood inde- 
pendence. " He only performs the actions of his own 
will, who stands in no need of the assistance of others to 
put his designs in execution : and hence it follows that 
the greatest of all blessings is not authority, but liberty. 
A man, truly free, wills only that which he can do, and 
does only that which pleases him. This is my funda- 
mental maxim. It need only be applied to childhood, 
and all the rules of education wdll naturally flow from 
it." 

" Whosoever does what he will is happy, provided he 
is capable of doing it himself; this is the case with man 
in a state of nature." 

But a very obvious difiiculty suggests itself. A child 
is necessarily the most dependent creature in the world. 
How, then, can he be brought up in what Rousseau calls 
liberty ? Rousseau sees the difficulty, and all that he 
can say is, that as real liberty is impossible for a child, 
you must give him sham liberty instead. " Let him 
always be his own master in appearance, and do 
you take care to be so in reality. There is no subjection 
so complete as that which preserves the appearance of 
liberty; it is by this means even the will itself is led cap- 
tive. The poor child, who knows nothing, who is capa- 
ble of nothing, is surely sufficiently at your mercy. 
Don't you dispose, with regard to him, of everything 



128 

about him ? Are not you capable of affecting him just 
as you please? His employment, his sports, his pleas- 
ures, his pains, are they not all in your power, without 
his knowing it ? Assuredly, he ought not to be com- 
pelled to do anything contrary to his inclinations; but 
then he ought not to be inclined to do anything contrary 
to yours: he ought not to take a step which you had not 
foreseen; nor open his lips to speak without your know- 
ing what he is about to say. When you have once 
brought him under such regulations, you may indulge 
him freely in all those corporal exercises which his age 
requires, without running the hazard of blunting his in- 
tellects. You will then see, that instead of employing 
all his subtle arts to shake off a burdensome and disa- 
greeable tyranny, he will be busied only in making the 
best use of everything about him. It is in this case you 
will have reason to be surprised at the subtility of his 
invention, and the ingenuity with which he makes every- 
thing that is in his power contribute to his gratification, 
without being obliged to prepossession or opinion. In thus 
leaving him at liberty to follow his own will, you will 
not augment his caprice. By being accustomed only to 
do that which is proper for his state and condition he 
will soon do nothing but what he ought; and though he 
should be in continual motion of body, yet, while he is 
employed only in the pursuit of his present and apparent 
interest, you will find his reasoning faculties display 
themselves better, and in a manner more peculiar to 
himself, than if he was engaged in studies of pure specu- 
lation." 

After this astonishing passage, the reader will proba- 
bly consider Rousseau's opinions of moral behavior mere 



FIRMNESS. 129 

matters of curiosity. Yet some of his advice is well 
worth considering. 

Although children should be made happy, they should 
by no means be shielded from every possible hurt. 
*' The first thing we ought to learn, and that which it 
is of the greatest consequence for us to know, is to suf- 
fer. It seems as if children were formed little and 
feeble to learn this important lesson without danger." 
"Excessive severity, as well as excessive indulgence, 
should be equally avoided. If you leave children to 
suffer, you expose their health, endanger their lives, and 
make them actually miserable; on the other hand, if 
you are too anxious to prevent their being sensible of any 
kind of pain and inconvenience, you only pave their way 
to feel much greater; you enervate their constitutions, 
make them tender and effeminate; in a word, you remove 
them out of their situation as human beings, into which 
they must hereafter return in spite of all your solicitude." 

His advice on firmness is also good. " When the 
child desires what is necessary, you ought to know and 
immediately comply w^ith its request: but to be induced 
to do anything by its tears, is to encourage it to cry; it 
is to teach it to doubt your good-will, and to think you 
are influenced more by importunity than benevolence. 
Beware of this, for if your child once comes to imagine 
you are not of a good disposition, he will soon be of a 
bad one; if he once thinks you complain, he will soon 
grow obstinate. You should comply with his request 
immediately if you do not intend to refuse it. Mortify 
him not with frequent denials, but never revoke a re- 
fusal once made him." Caprice, whether of the gov- 
ernor or of the child, is carefully to be shunned. 

H 



130 Rousseau's "emile." 

"There is an iiiDate sense of right and wrong im- 
planted in the human heart." Id j)roof of this, he gives an 
anecdote of an infant who almost screamed to death on 
receiving a blow from the nurse. " I am very certain," 
he says, " had a burning coal fallen by accident on the 
hand of the child, it would have been less agitated than 
by this slight blow, given with a manifest intention to 
hurt it." 

For punishments he gives a hint which has been 
worked out by Mr. H. Spencer. " Oppose to his indis- 
creet desires only physical obstacles, or the inconveniences 
naturally arising from the actions themselves ; these he will 
remember on a future occasion." 

Even in the matter of liberty, about which no one dis- 
agrees more heartily with Rousseau than I do, we may, 
I think, learn a lesson from him. "Emile acts from his 
own thoughts, and not from the dictation of others." 
*'If your head always directs your pupil's hands, his own 
head will become useless to him." There is a great 
truth in this. While differing so far from Rousseau, 
that I should require the most implicit obedience from 
boys, I feel that we must give them a certain amount of 
independent action and freedom from restraint, as a 
means of education. In many of our private schools, a 
boy is hardly called upon to exercise his will all day 
long. He rises in the morning when he must; at meals, 
he eats till he is obliged to stop; he is taken out for ex- 
ercise like a horse; he has all his indoor work prescribed 
for him, both as to time and quantity. " You accustom 
him to being always conducted, to being always a mere 
machine in the hands of others." As Montaigne quotes 
from Seneca, '•'• nunquam tutela sua fiunV^ [they never be- 



THE CHANGE AT TWELVE. 131 

come their own guardians]. Thus a boy grows up with- 
out having any occasion to think or act for himself. 
He is therefore without self-reliance. So much care is 
taken to prevent his doing wrong, that he gets to think 
only of checks from without. He is therefore incapable 
of self-restraint. Our public schools give more *' lib. 
-erty," and turn out better men. 

We will now suppose the child to have reached the 
age of twelve, a proficient in ignorance. His education 
must, at this period, alter entirely. The age for learn- 
ing has arrived. " Give me a child of twelve years of 
age who knows nothing at all, and at fifteen I will re- 
turn him to you as learned as any that you may have 
instructed earlier; with this difference, that the knowl- 
edge of yours will be only in his memory, and that of 
mine will be in his judgment." "To what use is it 
proper a child should put that redundancy of abilities, of 
which he is at present possessed, and which will fail him 
at another age ? He should employ it on those things 
which may be of utility in time to come. He should 
throw, if I may so express myself, the superfluity of his 
present being into the future. The robust child should 
provide for the subsistence of the feeble man; not in 
laying up his treasure in coffers whence thieve may steal, 
nor by intrusting it to the hands of others; but by keep- 
ing it in his own. To appropriate his acquisitions to 
himself he will secure them in the strength and dexteri- 
ty of his own arms, and in the capacity of his own head. 
This, therefore, is the time for employment, for instruc- 
tion, for study. Observe, also, that I have not arbitrar- 
ily fixed on this period for that purpose: nature itself 
plainly points it out to us. 



132 Rousseau's "emile." 

The education of Emile was to be, to use the language 
of the present day, scientific, not literary. Rousseau 
professed a hatred of books, which he said kept the stu- 
dent so long engaged upon the thoughts of other people 
as to have no time to make a store of his own. "The 
abuse of reading is destructive to knowledge. Imagin- 
ing ourselves to know everything we read, we conceive 
it unneccessary to learn it by other means. Too much 
reading, however, serves only to make us presumptuous 
blockheads. Of all the ages in which literature has 
flourished, reading was never so universal as in the pres- 
ent, nor were men in general ever so ignorant." 

Even science was to be studied, not so much with a 
view to knowledge, as to intellectual vigor. " You will 
remember it is my constant maxim, not to teach the boy 
a multiplicity of things, but to prevent his acquiring any 
but clear and precise ideas. His knowing nothing does 
not much concern me, provided he does not deceive him* 
self." 

Again he says: "Emile has but little knowledge; but 
what he has is truly his own ; he knows nothing by halves. 
Among the few things he knows, and knows well, the 
most important is, that there are many things which he 
is now ignorant of, and which he may one day knowj 
that there are many more which some men know and he 
never will; and that there is an infinity of others which 
neither he nor anybody else will ever know. He possesses a 
universal capacity, not in point of actual knowledge, but 
in the faculty of acquiring it; an open, intelligent genius, 
adapted to everything, and, as Montaigne says, if not 
instructed, capable of receiving instruction. It is suf- 
ficient for me that he knows how to discover the utility 



DESIRE OF KNOWLEDGE. 133 

of his actions, and the reason for his opinions. Once 
again, I say, my object is not to furnish his mind with 
knowledge, but to teach him the method of acquiring it 
when he has occasion for it; to instruct him how to hold 
it in estimation, and to inspire him, above all, with a 
love for truth. By this method, indeed, we make no 
great advances; but then we never take a useless step, 
nor are are we obliged to turn back again." 

The method of learning, therefore, was to be chosen 
with the view of bringing out the pupil's powers: and 
the subjects of instruction were to be sufficiently varied 
to give the pupil a notion of the connection between va- 
rious branches of knowledge, and to ascertain the direc- 
tion in which his taste and talent would lead him. 

The first thing to be aimed at is exciting a desire for 
knowledge. " Direct the attention of your pupil to the 
phenomena of nature, and you will soon awaken his 
curiosity; but to keep that curiosity alive, you must be 
in no haste to satisfy it. Put questions to him adapted 
to his capacity, and leave him to resolve them. He is 
not to know anything because you have told it to him, 
but because he has himself comprehended it: he should 
not learn, but discover science. If ever you substitute 
authority in the place of argument, he will reason no 
longer; he will be ever afterward bandied like a shuttle- 
cock between the opinions of others." Curiosity, when 
aroused, should be fostered by suspense, when the tutor 
must, above all things, avoid what Mr. Wilson, of Rugby, 
has lately called " didactic teaching." I do not at all ad- 
mire explanatory discourses," says Rousseau; "young 
people give little attention to them, and never retain 
them in memory. The things themselves are the best 



134 Rousseau's ''emile." 

explanations. I can never enough repeat it, that we 
make words of too much consequence; with our prating^ 
modes of education we make nothing but praters." 

The grand thing to be educed, was self -teaching, 
" Obliged to learn of himself, the pupil makes use of his 
own reason, and not of that of others; for to give no influ- 
ence to opinion, no weight should be given to authority p 
and it is certain that our errors arise less from ourselves 
than from others. From this continual exercise of the 
understanding will result a vigor of mind, like that 
which we give the body by labor and fatigue. Another 
advantage is, that we advance only in proportion to our 
strength. The mind, like the body, carries that only 
which it can carry. But when the understanding appro- 
priates everything before it commits it to the memory, 
whatever it afterward draws from thence is properly its 
own; whereas, in overcharging the mind without the 
knowledge of the understanding, we expose ourselves to- 
the inconvenience of never drawing out anything which 
belongs to us." 

Again he writes: "We acquire, without doubt, no- 
tions more clear and certain of things we thus learn of 
ourselves, than of those we are taught by others. An- 
other advantage also resulting from this method is, that 
we do not accustom ourselves to a servile submission ta 
the authority of others; but, by exercising our reason, 
grow every day more ingenious in the discovery of the 
relations of things, in connecting our ideas and in the 
contrivance of machines; whereas, by adopting those 
which are put into our hands, our invention grows dull 
and indifferent, as the man who never dresses himself^ 
but is served in everything by his servants, and drawn 



INDUSTRIAL BDUCATION. 135 

about everywhere by his horses, loses by degrees the 
activity and use of his limbs. Boileau boasted that he 
had taught Racine to rhyme with difficulty. Among 
the many admirable methods taken to abridge the study 
of the sciences, we are in great want of one to make us 
learn them with efforts 

Following in the steps of Locke, Rousseau required 
his model pupil to learn a trade. But this was not to be 
acquired as a mere amusement. First, Rousseau required 
it to secure the self-dependence of his pupil, and sec- 
ondly, to improve his head, as well as his hands. " If, 
instead of keeping a boy poring over books, I employ 
him in a workshop, his hands will be busied to the im- 
provement of his understanding; he will become a phil- 
osopher, while he thinks himself only an artisan." 

1 hope the quotations I have now given, will suffice to 
convey to the reader some of Rousseau's main ideas on 
the subject of education. The "Emile " was once a pop- 
ular book in this country. In David Williams' Lectures 
(dated 1789) was read, "Rousseau is in full possession 
of public attention. . . . To be heard on the subject 
of education it is expedient to direct our observations to 
his works." But now the case is different. In the words 
of Mr. Herman Merivale, "Rousseau was dethroned 
with the fall of his extravagant child the Republic' 
Perhaps we have been less influenced by both father and 
child than any nation of Europe; and if so, we owe this 
to our horror of extravagance. The English intellect is 
eminently decorous,* and Rousseau's disregard for 

* How is It that we have so many of us taken to making observations 
on the English mind, as if we were as external to it as the Japanese jug- 
glers ? Do we owe this to Matthew Arnold ? 



136 KOUSSEAU S "eMILE. 

" appearances," or rather his evident purpose of making 
an impression by defying "appearances" and saying 
just the opposite of what is expected, simply distresses 
it. Hence the " Emile " has long ceased to be read in 
this country, and the only English translation I 
have met with was published in the last century, and 
has not been reprinted.* So Rousseau now works upon 
us only through his disciples, especially Pestalozzi; 
but the reader will see from the passages I have 
selected, that we have often listened to Rousseau una- 
wares. 

The truths of the " Emile " will survive the fantastic 
forms which are there forced upon them. Of these 
truths, one of the most important, to my mind, is the 
distinction drawn between childhood and youth. I do 
not, of course, insist with Rousseau, that a child should 
be taught nothing till the day on which he is twelve 
years old, and then that instruction should begin all at 
once. There is no hard and fast line that can be drawn 
between the two stages of development: the change from 
one to the other is gradual, and in point of time differs 
greatly with the individual. But as I have elsewhere 
said, I believe the difference between the child and the 
youth to be greater than the difference between the 
youth and the man; and I believe further, that this is 
far too much overlooked in our ordinary education, 

*The above quotations are from this translation, but in correcting 
the proofs, I have discovered that it will not stand the test of being 
brought into such close contact with the French. I have altered it in 
many places, and am by no means satisfied with what I have left. 

[A translation of the selections from the first three books by Jules 
Steig, published in Paris, 1880, has been made, and may be had for 
$1.00. The full translation referred to in the text is found in two, in three, 
and in four volumes, and commands from $5,00 to ^lO.OO.J 



TRUTHS THAT SURVIVE. 137 

Rousseau, by drawing attention to the sleep of reason 
and to the activity and vigor of the senses in childhood, 
became one of the most important educational reform- 
ers, and a benefactor of mankind.* 

* This teaching of Rousseau's seems especially deserving of our con- 
sideration now that it has been proposed to elect boys of thirteen to 
Christ's Hospital, and to scholarships in other schools, by competitive 
examination. Whatever advantages may have resulted from such com- 
petition in the case of older pupils, we can not fairly assume that the sys- 
tem ought to be extended to children. Examinations can not test the 
proper development of children, or mark out the cleverest. Indeed, what 
they would really decide for us would be, not which were the cleverest 
children, but which had been entrusted to the cleverest *' crammers." 
Thus the master would be stimulated to " ply the memory and load the 
brain " for their livelihood ; and a race of precocious children terminating 
their intellectual career at the point where it ought to begin, would con- 
vince us of the wisdom of Rousseau, and drive us back to the neglected 
arts of being ignorant and losing time. See Mr. Arnold's vij^orous protest 
against examinations of children, School^ and Universities of the Conti- 
nent, chap, v., pp. 60, 61. 



VII. 

BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. 

One of the most famous movements ever made in 
educational reform was started in the last century by 
John Bernard Basedow. Basedow was born at Hamburg 
in 1723, the son of a wigmaker. His early years were 
not spent in the ordinary happiness of childhood. His 
mother he describes as melancholy, almost to madness, 
and his father was severe almost to brutality. It was 
the father's intention to bring up his son to his own 
business, but the lad ran away, and engaged himself as 
servant to a gentleman in Holstein. The master soon 
perceived what had never occurred to the father, viz., 
that the youth had very extraordinary abilities. Sent 
home with a letter from his master pointing out this 
notable discovery, Basedow was allowed to renounce 
the paternal calling, and to go to the Hamburg Gram- 
mar school [Gymnasium), where he was under Reimarus, 
the author of the " Wolfenblittel Fragment." In due 
course his friends managed to send him to the University 
of Leipzig to prepare himself for the least expensive of 
the learned professions — the clerical. Basedow, how- 
ever, was not a man to follow the beaten tracks. After 
an irregular life he left the university too unorthodox 
to think of being ordained, and in 1749 became private 
tutor to the children of Herr von Quaalen, in Holstein. 



AN UNORTHODOX WRITER. 139^ 

Id this situation his talent for inventing ilew methods of 
teaching first showed itself. He knew how to adapt him- 
self to the capacity of the children, and he taught them 
much by conversation, and in the way of play, connect- 
ing his instruction with surrounding objects in the house,^ 
garden, or fields. Through Quaalen's influence, he next 
obtained a professorship at Soroe, in Denmark, where he 
lectured for eight years; but his unorthodox writings^ 
raised a storm of opposition, and the Government finally 
removed him to the Gymnasium at Altona. Here he- 
still continued his efforts to change the prevailing opin- 
ion in religious matters, and so great a stir was made by 
the publication of his " Philalethia,''^ and his " Methodical 
Instruction in both Natural and Biblical Religion," that 
he and his family were refused the Communion at^ 
Altona, and his books were excluded, under a heavy 
penalty, from Liibeck. 

About this time Basedow, incited by Rousseau's 
" Emile^'' turned his attention to a fresh field of activity, 
in which he was to make as many friends as in theology^^ 
he had found enemies. A very general dissatisfaction 
was then felt with the condition of the schools. Physi- 
cal education was not attempted in them. The mother- 
tongue was neglected. Instruction in Latin and Greek^ 
which was the only instruction given, was carried on in 
a mechanical way, without any thought of improvements 
The education of the poor and of the middle classes 
received but little attention. " Youth," says Raumer,, 
" was in those days, for most children, a sadly harassed 
period. Instruction was hard and heartlessly severe.^ 
Grammar was caned into the memory; so were portions 
of Scripture and poetry. A common school punishment 



140 BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. 

was to learn by heart Psalm cxix. School-rooms were 
dismally dark. No one conceived it possible that the 
young could find pleasure in any kind of work, or that 
they had eyes for aught besides reading and writing. 
The pernicious age of Louis XIY. had inflicted on the 
poor children of the upper classes, hair curled by the 
barber and messed with powder and pomade, braided 
coats, knee breeches, silk stockings, and a dagger by the 
side — for active, lively children a perfect torture " 
{Geschichte der Pmdagogik^ ii. 297). Kant gave expression 
to a very wide-spread feeling when he said that what 
was wanting in education was no longer a reform but a 
revolution. 

Here, then, was a good scope offered for innovators, 
and Basedow was a prince of innovators. 

Having succeeded in interesting the Danish minister, 
Bernsdorf, in his plans, he was permitted to devote him- 
self entirely to a work on the subject of education 
whilst retaining his income from the Altona Gymnasi- 
um. The result was, his " Address to the Philanthro- 
pists and Men of Property, on Schools and Studies, and 
their influence on the Public Weal," in which he an- 
nounces the plan of his " Elementary." * In this address 
he calls upon princes, governments, town-councils, digni- 
taries of the Church, freemasons' lodges, etc., if they 
loved their fellow-creatures, to come to his assistance in 
bringing out his book. Nor did he call in vain. When 
the "Elementary " at length appeared (in 1774), he had 
to acknowledge contributions from the emperor Joseph 
JL, from Catherine H. of Russia, from Christian VII. of 



* I avail myself of the old substantival use of the word elementiry 
to express its German equivalent Elementarbuch. 



gcethe's impressions. 141 

Denmark, from the Grand Prince Paul, and many other 
celebrities, the total sum received being over 2000/. 

While Basedow was traveling about to get subscrip- 
tions, he spent some time in Frankfort, and thence made 
an excursion to Ems with two distinguished companions-, 
one of them Lavater, and the other a young man of 
five-and-twenty, already celebrated as the author of 
" Godtz von Berlichingen^^ and the "Sorrows of Werther." 
Of Basedow's personal peculiarities at this time, Goethe 
has left us an amusing description in the " Wahrheit und 
Bichtung "; but we must accept the portrait with caution: 
the sketch was thrown in as an artistic contrast with 
that of Lavater, and no doubt exaggerates those feat- 
ures in which the antithesis could be brought out with 
best effect. 

" One could not see," writes Goethe, " a more marked 
contrast than between Lavater and Basedow. As the 
lines of Lavater's countenance were free and open to 
the beholder, so were Basedow's contracted, and as it 
were drawn inward. Lavater's eye clear and benign, 
under a very wide eyelid; Basedow's on the other hand,, 
deep in his head, small, black, sharp, gleaming out from 
under shaggy eyebrows, whilst Lavater's frontal bone 
seemed bounded by two arches of the softest brown 
hair. Basedow's impetuous rough voice, his rapid and 
sharp utterances, a certain derisive laugh, an abrupt 
changing of the topic of conversation, and whatever 
else distinguished him, all were opposed to the peculiari- 
ties and the behavior by which Lavater had been mak- 
ing us overfastidious." 

Goethe approved of Basedow's desire to make all in- 
struction lively and natural, and thought that his system 



142 BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. 

would promote mental activity and give the young a 
fresher view of the world: but he finds fault with the 
"Elementary," and prefers the ^^Orbis Pictus^'' of Come- 
nius, in which subjects are presented in their natural 
connection. Basedow himself, says Goethe, was not a 
man either to edify or to lead other people. Although 
the object of his journey was to interest the public in 
his philanthropic enterprise, and to open not only hearts 
but purses, and he was able to speak eloquently and 
convincingly on the subject of education, he spoilt 
everything by his tirades against prevalent religious be- 
lief, especially on the subject of the Trinity. 

Gcfithe found in Basedow's society an opportunity of 
"exercising, if not enlightening," his mind, so he bore 
with his personal peculiarities, though apparently with 
great difficulty. Basedow seems to have delighted in 
worrying his associates. " He would never see any one 
quiet but he provoked him with mocking irony, in a 
hoarse voice, or put him to confusion by an unexpected 
question, and laughed bitterly when he had gained his 
end; yet he was pleased when the object of his jests 
was quick enough to collect himself, and answer in the 
same strain." So far Goethe was his match, but he was 
nearly routed by Basedow's use of bad tobacco, and of 
some tinder still worse with which he was constantly 
lighting his pipe and poisoning the air insufferably. 
He soon discovered Goethe's dislike to this preparation 
of his, so he took a malicious pleasure in using it and 
dilating upon its merits. 

Here is an odd account of their intercourse. During 
Iheir stay at Ems, Goethe went a great deal into fashion- 
:able society. " To make up for these dissipations," he 



OPENING OF THE PHILANTHROPIN. 143 

writes, " I always passed a part of the night with Base- 
dow. He never went to bed, but dictated without ces- 
sation. Occasionally he cast himself on the couch and 
slumbered, while his amanuensis sat quietly, pen in hand, 
ready to continue his work when the half-awakened 
author should once more give free course to his thoughts. 
All this took place in a close confined chamber, filled 
with the fumes of tobacco and the odious tinder. As 
often as I was disengaged from a dance I hastened up 
to Basedow, who was ready at once to speak and dispute 
on any question; and when after a time I hurried again 
to the ball-room, before I had closed the door behind 
me he would resume the thread of his essay as com- 
posedly as if he had been engaged with nothing else." 

It was through a friend of Goethe's, Behrisch, whose 
acquaintance we make in the " Wahrheit und Bichtung^'' 
that Basedow became connected with Prince Leopold of 
Dessau. Behrisch was tutor to the Prince's son, and by 
him the Prince was so interested in Basedow's plans that 
he determined to found an Institute in which they should 
be realized. Basedow was therefore called to Dessau, 
and under his direction was opened the famous Philan- 
thropin. Then for the first, and probably for the last 
time, a school was started in which use and wont were 
entirely set aside, and everything done on " improved 
principles." Such a bold enterprise attracted the atten- 
tion of all interested in education, far and near: but it 
would seem that few parents considered their own chil- 
dren vilia corpora [cheap material] on whom experiments 
might be made for the public good. When, in May, 1 VV6, 
a number of schoolmasters and others collected from 
different parts of Germany, and even from beyond 



144 BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. 

Germany, to be present by Basedow's invitation at an 
examination of the children, they found only thirteen 
pupils in the Philanthropin, including Basedow's own 
son and daughter. 

Before we investigate how Basedow's principles were 
embodied in the Philanthropin, let us see the form in 
which he had already announced them. The great 
work from which all children were to be taught was the 
" Elementary." As a companion to this was published 
the " Book of Method " (Methoden-bueh) for parents and 
teachers. The " Elementary " is a work in which a 
great deal of information about things in general is 
given in the form of dialogue, interspersed with tales 
and easy poetry. Except in bulk, it does not seem to 
me to differ very materially from many of the reading 
books which, in late years, have been published in this 
country. It had the advantage, however, of being ac- 
companied by a set of engravings to which the text re- 
ferred, though they were too large to be bound up with 
it. The root-ideas of Basedow put forth in his " Book 
of Method," and other writings, are those of Rousseau. 
For example, " You should attend to nature in your 
children far more than to art. The elegant manners 
and usages of the world are for the most part unnatural 
(Unnatur), These come of themselves in later years. 
Treat children like children, that they may remain the 
longer uncorrupted. A boy whose acutest faculties are 
his senses, and who has no perception of anything ab- 
stract, must first of all be made acquainted with the 
world as it presents itself to the senses. Let this be 
shown him in nature itself, or where this is impossible, 
in faithful drawings or models. Thereby can he, even 



SUBJECTS TAUGHT. 145 

in play, learn how the various objects are to be named. 
Comenius alone has pointed out the right road in this 
matter. By all means reduce the wretched exercises of 
the memory." Elsewhere he gives instances of the sort 
of things to which this method should be applied. 
1st. Man. Here he would use pictures of foreigners 
and wild men; also a skeleton, a hand in spirits, and 
other objects still more appropriate to a surgical mu- 
seum. 2d. Animals. Only such animals are to be de- 
picted as it is useful to know about, because there is 
much that ought to be known, and a good method of 
instruction must shorten rather than increase the hours 
of study. Articles of commerce made from the animals 
may also be exhibited. 3d. Trees and plants. Only 
the most important are to be selected. Of these the 
seeds also must be shown, and cubes formed of the dif- 
ferent woods. Gardeners' and farmers' implements are 
to be explained. 4th. Minerals and chemical sub- 
stances. 5th. Mathematical instruments for weighing 
and measuring; also the air-pump, siphon, and the like. 
The form and motion of the earth are to be explained 
with globes and maps. 6th. Trades. The use of vari- 
ous tools is to be taught. 7th. History. This is to be 
illustrated by engravings of historical events. 8th. 
Commerce. Samples of commodities may be produced, 
9th. The younger children should be shown pictures of 
familiar objects about the house and its surroundings. 

We see from this list that Basedow contemplated giv- 
ing his educational course the charm of variety. Indeed, 
with that candor in acknowledging mistakes which 
partly makes amends for the effrontery too common in 
the trurapetings of his own performances, past, present, 



146 BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. 

and to come, he confesses that when he began the " Ele- 
mentary*' he had exaggerated notions of the amount boys 
were capable of learning, and that he had subsequently 
very much contracted his proposed curriculum. And 
even the " Revolution," which was to introduce so much 
new learning into the schools, could not afford entirely 
to neglect the old. However pleased parents might be 
with the novel acquirements of their children, they were 
not likely to be satisfied without the usual knowledge of 
Latin, and still less would they tolerate the neglect of 
French, which, in German polite society of the eighteenth 
century, was the recognized substitute for the vulgar 
tongue. These, then, must be taught. But the old 
methods might be abandoned, if not the old subjects. 
Basedow proposed to teach both French and Latin by 
conversation. Let a cabinet of models, or something of the 
kind, be shown the children; let them learn the names 
of the different objects in Latin or French; then let 
questions be asked in those languages, and the right 
answers at first put into the children's mouths. When 
they have in this way acquired some knowledge of the 
language, they may apply it to the translating of an easy 
book. Basedow does not claim originality for the con- 
versational method. He appeals to the success with 
which it had been already used in teaching French. '*Are 
the French governesses," he asks, " who without vocab- 
ularies and grammars, first by conversation, then by 
reading, teach their language very successfully and 
very rapidly in schools of from thirty to forty children, 
better teachers than most masters in our Latin schools ? " 
On the subject of religion the instruction was to be 
quite as original as in matters of less importance. The 



"feed's journey to DESSAU." 147 

teachers were to give an impartial account of all relig- 
ions, and nothing but " natural religion " was to be in- 
culcated. 

The key-note of the whole system was to be — everything 
4iccording to nature. The natural desires and inclinations 
of the children were to be educated and directed aright, 
but in no case to be suppressed. 

These, then, were the principles and the methods 
which, as Basedow believed, were to revolutionize edu- 
cation through the success of the Philanthropin. Base- 
dow himself, as we might infer from Goethe's description 
of him, was by no means a model director for the model 
Institution, but he was fortunate in his assistants. Of 
these he had three at the time of the public examination, 
of whom Wolke is said to have been the ablest. 

A lively description of the examination was afterward 
published by Herr Schummel of Magdeburg, under the 
title of " Fred's Journey to Dessau." It purports to be 
written by a boy of twelve years old, and to describe 
what took place without attempting criticism. A few 
extracts will give a notion of the instruction carried 
on in the Philanthropin. 

" I have just come from a visit with my father to the 
Philanthropin, where I saw Herr Basedow, Herr Wolke, 
Herr Simon, Herr Schweighseuser, and the little Philan- 
thropinists. I am delighted with all that I have seen, 
and hardly know where to begin my description of it. 
There are two large white houses, and near them a field 
with trees. A pupil — not one of the regular scholars, 
but of those they call Famulants (a poorer class, who 
were servitors) — received us at the door, and asked if we 
wished to see Herr Basedow. We said * Yes,' and he 



148 BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. 

took US into the other house, where we found Herr Base- 
dow in a dressing-gown, writing at a desk. We came 
at an inconvenient time, and Herr Basedow said he was 
very busy. He was very friendly, however, and prom- 
ised to visit us in the evening. We went into the other 
house, and inquired for Herr Wolke." By him we were 
taken to the scholars. " They have," says Fred, " their 
hair cut very short, and no wig-maker is employed. 
Their throats are quite open, and their shirt-collar falls 
back over their coats." Further on he describes the ex- 
amination. "The little ones have gone through the 
oddest performances. They play at *word-of-comraand.^ 
Eight or ten stand in line like soldiers, and Herr "Wolke 
is officer. He gives the word in Latin, and they must do 
whatever he says. For instance, when he says Claudite 
otfw/o«, they all shut their eyes; when he says Circumspicitey. 
they look about them; Imitamini sartorem [Imitate the 
tailor], they all sew like tailors; Imitamini sutorem [Imi- 
tate the cobbler], they draw the waxed thread like the 
cobblers. Herr Wolke gave a thousand different com- 
mands in the drollest fashion. Another game 'the hiding 
game,' I will also teach you. Some one writes a name, 
and hides it from the children — the name of some part 
of the body, or of a plant, or animal, or metal — and the 
children guess what it is. Whoever guesses right gets 
an apple or a piece of cake. One of the visitors wrote 
Intestina [The intestines], and told the children it was a 
part of the body. Then the guessing began. One 
guessed caput [head], another nasus [nose], another o» 
[mouth], another manus [hand], ^^5 [foot], rf?^^^« [fingers], 
pectus [breast], and so forth, for a long time; but one of 
them hit it at last. Next, Herr Wolke wrote the name 



MODE OF TEACHING. 149 

of a beast, a quadruped. Then came the guesses: leo 
[lion], ursus [bear], camelus [camel], elephas [elephant], 
and so on, till one guessed right — it was mus [mouse]. 
Then a town was written, and they guessed Lisbon, 
Madrid, Paris, London, till a child won with St. Peters- 
burg. They have another game which is this: Herr 
Wolke gave the command in Latin, and they imitated 
the noises of different animals, and made us laugh till 
we were tired. They roared like lions, crowed like 
cocks, mewed like cats, just as they were bid." 

The subject that was next handled had also the effect 
of making the strangers laugh, till a severe reproof from 
Herr Wolke restored their gravity. A picture was 
brought, in which was represented a sad-looking woman, 
whose person indicated the approaching arrival of 
another subject for education. From one part of the 
picture it also appeared that the prospective mother, 
with a prodigality of forethought, had got ready cloth- 
ing for both a boy and a girl. After a warning from 
Herr Wolke, that this was a most serious and important 
subject, the children were questioned on the topics the 
picture suggested. They were further taught the debt 
of gratitude they owed to their mothers, and the Ger- 
man fiction about the stork dismissed with due contempt. 

Next came the examination in arithmetic. Here there 
seems to have been nothing remarkable, except that 
all the rules were worked viva voce [aloud]. From the 
arithmetic Herr Wolke went on to an "Attempt at vari- 
ous small drawings." He asked the children what he 
should draw. Some one answered leone?n. He then 
pretended he was drawing a lion, but put a beak to it; 
whereupon the children shouted Non est leo — leones non 



150 BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. 

habent rostrum, [It isn't a lion — lions have no beak] ! He 
went on to other subjects, as the children directed him^ 
sometimes going wrong that the children might put him 
right.* In the next exercise dice were, introduced, and 
the children threw to see who should give an account of 
an engraving. The engravings represented workmen at 
their different trades, and the child had to explain the 
process, the tools, etc. A lesson on plowing and harrow- 
ing was given in French, and another, on Alexander's 
expedition to India, in Latin. Four of the pupils trans- 
lated passages from Curtius and from Castellion's Bible, 
which were read to them. " These children," said the 
teacher, " knew not a word of Latin a year ago." "The 
listeners were well pleased with the Latin," writes Fredy 
** except two or three, whom I heard grumbling that this 
was all child's play, and that if Cicero, Livy, and Horace 
were introduced, it would soon be seen what was the 
value of Fhilanthropinist Latin." After the examina- 
tion two comedies were acted by the children, one in 
French, the other in German. 

Most of the strangers seem to have left Dessau with a 
favorable impression of the Philanthropin. They were 
especially struck with the brightness and animation of 
the children. 

How far did the Philanthropin really deserve their 
good opinion ? The conclusion to which we are driven 
by Fred's narrative is, that Basedow carried to excess 
his principle — " treat children as children, that they may 

* As an amusing specimen of the taste of tlie time, I may mention, that 
when in drawing a house Herr Wolke put the door not quite in the middle,, 
the children insisted on having another door to correspond propter sym- 
metriam [for the sake of symmetry]. 



MEEITS OF THE PHILANTHROPIN. 151 

remain the longer uncorrupted ; " and that the Philan- 
thropin was, in fact, nothing but a good infant-school. 
Surely none of the thirteen children who were the sub- 
jects of Basedow's experiments could have been more 
than ten years old. But if we consider Basedow's sys- 
tem to have been intended for children, say between the 
ages of six and ten, we must allow that it possessed 
great merits. At the very beginning of a boy's learn- 
ing, it has always been too much the custom to make 
him hate the sight of a book, and escape at every oppor- 
tunity from school-work, by giving him difficult tasks, 
and neglecting his acutest faculties. " Children love 
motion and noise," says Basedow : " here is a hint from 
nature." Yet the youngest children in most schools are 
expected to keep quiet and to sit at their books for as 
many hours as the youths of seventeen or eighteen. 
Their vivacity is repressed with the cane. Their delight 
in exercising their hands and eyes and ears is taken no 
notice of; and they are required to keep their attention 
fixed on subjects often beyond their comprehension, and 
almost always beyond the range of their interests. 
Every one who has had experience in teaching boys 
knows how hard it is to get them to throw themselves 
heartily into any task whatever; and probably this diffi- 
culty arises in many cases, from the habits of inattention 
and of shirking school-work which the boys have ac- 
quired almost necessarily from the dreariness of their 
earliest lessons. Basedow determined to change all this; 
and in the Philanthropin no doubt he succeeded. We 
have already seen some of the expedients by which he 
Bought to render school- work pleasurable. He appealed, 
wherever it was possible, to the children's senses; and 



152 BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. 

these, especially the sight, were trained with great care 
by exercises, such as drawing, shooting at a mark, etc. 
One of these exercises, intended to give quick percep- 
tion, bears a curious likeness to what has since been 
practiced in a very different educational system. A pic- 
ture, with a somewhat varied subject, was exhibited for 
a short time and removed. The boys had then, either 
verbally or on paper, to give an account of it, naming 
the different objects in proper order. Houdin, if I 
rightly remember, tells us that the young thieves of 
Paris are required by their masters to make a mental 
inventory of the contents of a shop window, which they 
see only as they walk rapidly by. Other exercises of 
the Philanthropin connected the pupils with more hon- 
orable callings. They became acquainted with both 
skilled and unskilled manual labor. Every boy was 
taught a handicraft, such as carpentering and turning, 
and was put to such tasks as threshing corn. Basedow's 
division of the twenty-four hours was the following; 
Eight hours for sleep, eight for food and amusement, 
and, for the children of the rich, six hours of school- 
work, and two of manual labor. In the case of the chil- 
dren of the poor, he would have the division of the last 
eight hours inverted, and would give for school-work 
two, and for manual labor six. The development of the 
body was specially cared for in the Philanthropin. 
Gymnastics were now first introduced into modern 
schools; and the boys were taken long expeditions on 
foot — the commencement, I believe, of a practice now 
common throughout Germany. 

As I have already said, Basedow proved a very unfit 
person to be at the head of the model Institution. 



KANTS VERDICT. 153 

Many of his friends agreed with Herder, that he was 
not fit to have calves intrusted to him, much less chil- 
dren, He soon resigned his post; and was succeeded 
by Campe, who had been one of the visitors at the pub- 
lic examination. Campe did not remain long at the 
Philanthropin; but left it to set up a school, on like 
principles, at Hamburg. His fame now rests on his 
writings for the young, one of which — "Robinson 
Crusoe the Younger " — is still a general favorite. 

Other distinguished men became connected with the 
Philanthropin — among them Salzman, and Matthison 
the poet — and the number of pupils rose to over fifty; 
gathered, we are told, from all parts of Europe between 
Riga and Lisbon. But this number is by no means a 
fair measure of the interest, nay, enthusiasm which the 
experiment excited. We find Pastor Oberlin raising 
money on his wife's ear-rings to send a donation. We 
find the philosopher Kant prophesying that quite an 
other race of men would grow up, now that education* 
according to Nature, had been introduced. 

These hopes were disappointed. Kant confesses as 
much in the following passage in his treatise " On 
Pedagogy." 

" One fancies, indeed, that experiments in education 
would not be necessary; and that we might judge by 
the understanding whether any plan would turn out 
well or ill. But this is a great mistake. Experience 
shows that often in our experiments we get quite oppo- 
site results from what we had anticipated. We see, too, 
that since experiments are necessary, it is not in the 
power of one generation to form a complete plan of 
education. The only experimental school which, to 



154 BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. 

some extent, made a beginning in clearing the road, 
was the Institute at Dessau. This praise at least must 
be allowed it, notwithstanding the many faults which 
could be brought up against it — faults which are sure to 
show themselves when we come to the results of our 
experiments, and which merely prove that fresh experi- 
ments are necessary. It was the only school in which 
the teachers had liberty to work according to their own 
methods and schemes, and where they were in free com- 
munication both among themselves and with all learned 
men throughout Germany." 

We observe here, that Kant speaks of the Philanthro- 
pin as a thing of the past. It was finally closed in 1793. 
But even from Kant we learn that the experiment had 
been by no means a useless one. The conservatives, of 
course, did not neglect to point out that young Philan- 
thropinists, when they left school, were not in all re- 
spects the superiors of their fellow-creatures. But, 
although no one could pretend that the Philanthropin 
had effected a tithe of what Basedow promised, and the 
"friends of humanity" throughout Europe expected, it 
had introduced many new ideas, which in time had their 
influence, even in tlie schools of the opposite party. 
Moreover, teachers who had been connected with the 
Philanthropin, founded schools on similar principles in 
different parts of Germany and Switzerland, some of 
which long outlived the parent institution. Their doc- 
trines, too, made converts among other masters, the 
most celebrated of whom was Meierotto of Berlin. 

Little remains to be said of Basedow. He lived 
chiefly at Dessau, earning his subsistence by private 
tuition, and giving great offense by his irregularities. 



LAST WOBDS. 155 

especially by drinking. In 1790, when visiting Magde- 
burg, he died, after a short illness, in his sixty-seventh 
year. His last words were, " I wish my body to be dis- 
lected for the good of my fellow-creatures." 



VIII. 
PESTALOZZI. 

John Henry Pestalozzi, the most celebrated of edu- 
cational reformers, was born at Zurich3 in 1746. At six 
years old he lost his father, who, leaving his family in 
needy circumstances, implored his servant, " the faithful 
l^abeli, never to desert his wife and children. Babeli 
kept sacredly the promise she gave to the dying man, 
and she had an equal share with the mother in bringing 
up the great educator. 

With no companions of his own age, Pestalozzi became 
so completely a mother's child, that, as he himself tells 
us, he grew up a stranger to the world he lived in. This 
lonely childhood had its influence in making him, what 
he remained through life, a man of excitable feelings 
and lively imagination, which so entirely had the mas- 
tery over him as to prevent anything like due circum- 
spection and forethought.* 

From his grandfather, a country clergyman, with 
whom he often stayed, he received another important 
influence, strong religious impressions. 

*This will be best understood from the following anecdote. Wheni 
in after years, he was in great pecuniary distress, and his family were 
without the necessaries of life, he went to a friend's house and borrowed 
a sum of money. On his way home, he fell in with a peasant who was 
lamenting the loss of a cow. Carried away as usual by his feelings, 
Pestalozzi gave the man all the money he had borrowed, and ran away to 
-escape his thanks. 



HIS YOUTH. 157 

When at length he was sent to a day-school, he 
proved the awkwardest and most helpless of the schol- 
ars, and nevertheless showed signs of rare abilities. 
Among his playmates he was exposed to a good deal of 
ridicule,and was dubbed by them Harry Oddity of Fool- 
borough, but his good nature and obliging disposition 
gained him many friends. No doubt his friends profited 
from his willingness to do anything for them. We find 
that when, on the shock of an earthquake, teachers and 
scholars alike rushed out of the school-house, Harry 
Oddity was the boy sent back to fetch out caps and 
books. In school-work, he says that though one of the 
best boys in the school, he often made mistakes which 
even the worst boys were not guilty of. He could un- 
derstand the sense of what he was taught, and content 
with this, he neglected the form and the exercises neces- 
sary to give hirn a practical acquaintance with the subjects 

As he grew up, the unpractical side of his character 
was more and more strongly developed. To use his own 
words, " Unfortunately, the tone of public instruction in 
my native town at this period was in a high degree cal- 
culated to foster this visionary fancy of taking an active 
interest in, and believing oneself capable of, the practice 
of things in which one had by no means sufficient exer- 
cise. While we were yet boys, we fancied that by a 
superficial school-acquaintance with the great civil life 
of Greece and Rome, we could eminently prepare our- 
selves for the little civil life in one of the Swiss cantons. 
By the writings of Rousseau this tendency was increased 
— a tendency which was calculated neither to preserve 
what was good in the old institutions, nor to introduce 
anything substantially better." 



168 JOHN HENRY PESTALOZZI. 

Lavater, when a young man of twenty, formed a 
league which was joined by Pestalozzi, a lad of fifteen. 
This league brought a public charge of injustice against 
Grebel, the governor of the Canton, and against Brunner, 
the mayor of Zurich. They also declared themselves 
against unworthy ministers of religion. " The hate of 
wrong and love of right," were, with Pestalozzi, not as 
we so often find them, mere juvenile enthusiasms, but 
they remained with him for life. The oppression of the 
peasants moved him to a strong antagonism against the 
aristocracy, and when he was no longer young, he spoke 
of them as men on stilts, who must descend among the 
people before they could secure a natural and firm posi- 
tion. He also satirizes them in some of his fables, as, 
e. g., that of the " Fishes and the Pikes." " The fishes in 
a pond brought an accusation against the pikes who were 
making great ravages among them. The judge, an old 
pike, said that their complaint was well founded, and 
that the defendants, to make amends, should allow two 
ordinary fish every year to become pikes." 

His desire to be the champion of the ill-used peas- 
antry, determined him in the choice of a profession, and 
he took to the study of the law. He had been intended for 
a clergyman, and, according to one account, had actually 
preached a trial sermon, which was a failure: with 
his usual inaccuracy, he even went wrong in repeating 
the Lord's prayer. 

Whilst a law student, he lost his most intimate friend 
Bluntschli, who died of consumption. Bluntschli showed 
that he thoroughly understood Pestalozzi's character by 
his parting advice to him: "I die,*' said he, "and when you 
are left to yourself, you must not plunge into any career 



THE NEUHOF SPECULATION. 159 

which, from your good natured and confiding disposi- 
tition, might become dangerous to you. Seek for a 
quiet, tranquil career; and unless you have at your side 
a man who will faithfully assist you with a calm, dis- 
passionate knowledge of men and things, by no means 
embark in any extensive undertaking the failure of which 
would in any way be perilous to you." 

Soon after this, Pestalozzi, from over-study, or rather 
perhaps from over-speculation — for he employed himself 
rather in forming theories of what should be than in ac- 
quiring a practical acquantance with the law as it was — 
became dangerously ill. The doctor advised him to go 
into the country, and, influenced not more by this advice 
than by Rousseau's doctrine of the natural state, 
Pestalozzi renounced the study of books, burnt his 
MSS., and went to learn farming. 

In his new employment he found himself with a 
friend of progress. '* I had come to him," says Pestalozzi, 
" a political visionary, though with many profound and 
correct attainments, views, and anticipations in political 
matters. I went away from him just as great an agri- 
cultural visionary, though with many enlarged and cor- 
rect ideas and intentions with regard to agriculture." 

A rich Zurich firm was persuaded by Pestalozzi that 
the cultivation of madder would succeed on some poor 
land which was to be sold near the village of Birr at a 
very small price. With money advanced by them, he 
bought the land, built a house, which he called Neuhof 
(New Farm), and set to work. This was in 1767, when 
he was only just of age. He was of course, in love, 
and the lady belonged to a rich family. The following 
letter, which he addressed to her, has a double interest ; 



160 JOHN HENRY PESTALOZZI. 

it gives us an insight into the noble character, as well as 
the weaknesses, of the writer, and is, moreover, one of 
the most singular love-letters in existence. 

After telling her that he felt it his duty to limit his 
visits to her, as he had not the slightest ability to con- 
ceal his feelings, he proposed a correspondence, in which 
" we shall make our undisguised thoughts known to each 
other with all the freedom of oral conversation. Yes,'' 
he continues, " I will open myself fully and freely to 
you; I will even now, with the greatest candor, let you 
look as deep into my heart as I am myself able to pene- 
trate; I will show you my views in the light of my 
present and future condition, as clearly as I see them 
myself. Dearest Schultheiss, those of my faults which 
appear to me most important in relation to the situation 
in which I may be placed in after-life are, improvidence, 
incautiousness, and a want of presence of mind to meet 
unexpected changes in my prospects. I know not how 
far these failings may be diminished by my efforts to 
counteract them by calm judgment and experience. At 
present, I have them still in such a degree that I dare 
not conceal them from the maiden I love; they are 
faults, my dear, which deserve your fullest consideration. 
I have other faults, arising from my irritability and 
sensitiveness, which oftentimes will not submit to my 
judgment. I very frequently allow myself to run into 
excesses in praising and blaming, in my liking and dis- 
liking; I cleave so strongly to many things which I 
possess that the force with which I feel myself attached 
to them often exceeds the bounds of reason. Whenever 
my country or my friend is unhappy, I am myself un- 
happy. Direct your attention to this weakness. There 



A QUEER LOVE-LETTEE. 161 

will be times when the cheerfulness and tranquillity of 
my soul will sujffer under it. If even it does not hinder 
me in the discharge of my duties, yet I shall scarcely 
ev^er be great enough to fulfill them in such adverse 
circumstances with the cheerfulness and tranquillity of a 
wise man who is ever true to himself. Of my great, 
and indeed very reprehensible, negligence in all matters 
of etiquette, and generally in all matters which are not 
in themselves of importance, I need not speak; any one 
may see them at first sight of me. I also owe you the 
open confession, my dear, that I shall always consider 
my duties toward my beloved partner subordinate to my 
duties toward my country; and that, although I shall be 
the tenderest husband, nevertheless I shall hold myself 
bound to be inexorable to the tears of my wife if she 
should ever attempt to restrain me by them from the 
direct performance of my duties as a citizen, whatever 
this must lead to. My wife shall be the confidante of my 
heart, the partner of all my most secret counsels. A 
great and honest simplicity shall reign in my house. 
And one thing more. My life will not pass without im- 
portant and very critical undertakings. I shall not forget 
the precepts of Menalk, and my first resolutions to de- 
vote myself wholly to my country. I shall never, from 
fear of man, refrain from speaking when I see that the 
good of my country calls upon me to speak. My whole 
heart is my country's; I will risk all to alleviate the 
need and misery of my fellow-countrymen. What con- 
sequences may the undertakings to which I feel myself 
urged on draw after them! how unequal to them am 1 1 
and how imperative is my duty to show you the possi- 
J 



162 JOHN HENRY PESTALOZZI. 

bility of the great dangers which they may bring 
upon me ! 

"My dear, my beloved friend, I have now spoken 
candidly of my character and my aspirations. Reflect 
upon everything. If the traits which it was my duty 
to mention diminish your respect for me, you will still 
esteem my sincerity, and you will not think less highly 
of me, that I did not take advantage of your want of 
acquaintance with my character for the attainment of 
my inmost wishes." ' 

The young lady addressed was worthy of the letter 
and of its writer. In 1769, two years after Pestalozzi 
had established himself at Neuhof, the marriage took 
place — an unequal match, as it then seemed, the bride 
having money and personal attractions, and the bride- 
groom being notably deficient in both respects. Their 
married life extended over fifty years, and during that 
period the forebodings of the letter were amply realized. 
Pestalozzi sacrificed the comfort and worldly prospects 
of his family equally with his own to the public good, 
and yet we may well believe that Madame Pestalozzi 
never repented of her choice. 

The new married couple were soon in difficulties. 
The Zurich firm, not satisfied with the rumors which 
reached them of the management of the madder planta 
tion, sent two competent judges to examine into the 
state of affairs, and so unfavorable was their report, 
that the firm preferred getting back what money they 
could to leaving it any longer in Pestalozzi's hands 
*'The cause of the failure of my undertaking," says 
Pestalozzi, "lay essentially and exclusively in myself, 



HIS FIRST SCHOOL. 163 

and in my pronounced incapacity for every kind of 
undertaking which requires practical ability." By means 
of his wife's property, however, he was enabled to go on 
with his farming. 

Pestalozzi now resolved on an experiment such as 
Bluntschli had warned him against, and such as he him- 
self must have had in his mind when he wrote his love- 
letter. Some years before this, he had had his attention 
drawn to the subject of education by the publication of 
Rousseau's ^^ Emile.^'' Feeling deeply the degradation of 
the surrounding peasantry, he looked for some means of 
raising them out of it, and it seemed to him, that the 
most hopeful way was to begin with the young, and to 
train them to capacity and intelligence. He therefore, in 
1775, started a poor school. He soon had fifty children 
sent him, whom he housed, boarded, and clothed, with- 
out payment from the parents. The children were to 
work for their maintenance, during the summer in the 
fields, and in the winter at spinning, and other handi- 
crafts. Pestalozzi himself was the schoolmaster, Neu- 
hof was the schoolhouse. 

In this new enterprise Pestalozzi was still more unsuc- 
cessful than he had been in growing the madder. He 
.^jowas very badly treated both by parents and children, 
■^he latter often running away directly they got new 
clothes; and his industrial experiments were so carried 
on that they were a source of expense rather than profit. 
He says himself, that, contrary to his own principles, 
which should have led him to begin at the beginning 
and lay a good foundation in teaching, he put the chil- 
dren to work that was too difficult for them, wanted 
them to spin fine thread before their hands got steadiness 



164 JOHN HENRY PESTALOZZI. 

and skill by exercise on the coarser kind, and to manu- 
facture muslin before they could turn out well-made 
cotton goods. " Before I was aware of it," he adds, " I 
was deeply involved in debt, and the greater part of my 
dear wife's property and expectations had, as it were, in 
an instant gone up in smoke." 

We have now come to the most gloomy period in Pes- 
talozzi's history, a period of eighteen years, and those 
the best years in a man's life, which Pestalozzi spent in 
great distress, from poverty without, and doubt and 
despondency within. When he got into difficulties, his 
friends, he tells us, loved him without hope: "in the 
whole surrounding district it was everywhere said that I 
was a lost man, that nothing more could be done for 
me." '* In his only too elegant country-house," we are 
told, " he often wanted money, bread, fuel, to protect 
himself against hunger and cold." '* Eighteen yearsl 
— what a time for a soul like his to wait! History passes 
lightly over such a period. Ten, twenty, thirty years — 
it makes but a cipher difference if nothing great happens 
in them. But with what agony must he have seen day 
after day, year after year gliding by, who in his fervent 
soul longed to labor for the good of mankind and yet 
looked in vain for the opportunity! " (Palmer.) 

In after years he thus wrote of this gloomy period r 
*' Deep dissatisfaction was gnawing my heart. Eternal 
truth and eternal rectitude were converted by my pas- 
sion to airy castles. With a hardened mind, I clung 
stubbornly to mere sounds, which had lost within me the 
basis of truth. Thus I degraded myself every day more 
and more with the worship of commonplace and the 
trumpetings of those quackeries, wherewith these mod- 



A GLOOMY INTERVAL. 165 

ern times pretend to better the condition of mankind." 
Again, he says, " My head was gray, yet I was still a 
child. With a heart in which all the foundations of 
life were shaken, I still pursued, in those stormy times, 
my favorite object, but my way was one of prejudice, of 
passion, and of error." 

But these years were not spent in idleness. Having 
no other means of influence, and indeed no other em- 
ployment, he took to writing, and his experience as a 
teacher stood him in good stead as an author. In 1780 
appeared, though not as a separate publication, the 
" Evening Hour of a Hermit." To this series of aphor- 
isms Pestalozzi appealed many years afterward to prove 
that he had always held the same views which he subse- 
quently tried to carry out in practice."* 

We hardly know how to reconcile the calm faith which 
is shown in the "Evening Hour" with what Pestalozzi 
has told us of his frame of mind at this period, and with 
the fact that he joined a French revolutionary society — 
the Illuminati — and became their leader in Switzerland- 
He did not, however, continue long with them; and 
there is no diflJculty in reconciling the "Evening Hour" 
with all that we know of Pestalozzi in later life. 

In 1781 appeared the book on which Pestalozzi's fame 
as an author mainly rests — "Leonard and Gertrude " — 
a work extorted from him, as he says, by sympathy with 
the sufferings of the people. In this simple tale — which 
^' flowed from his pen, he knew not how, and developed 
itself of its own accord " — we have an admirable picture 
of village life in Switzerland. No wonder that the 

* [For translated extracts, see Barnard's Journal of Education, vi. 

169.] 



166 JOHN HENEY PESTALOZZI. 

Berne Agricultural Society sent the author a gold medal, 
with a letter of thanks; and that the hook excited vast 
interest, both in its Dative country and throughout Ger- 
many. It is only strange that " Leonard and Gertrude " 
has not become a favorite, by means of translations, in 
other countries. There was, indeed, an English transla- 
tion, in two volumes, published more than fifty years 
ago; but this forerunner of the tales of Gotthelf is now 
hardly known in this country, even by name.* In the 
works of a great artist, we see natural objects repre- 
sented with perfect fidelity, and yet with a life breathed 
into them by genius which is wanting, or at least is not 
visible to common eyes, in the originals. Just so do we 
find Swiss peasant life depicted by Pestalozzi. The de- 
lineation is evidently true to nature; and, at the same 
time, shows Nature as she reveals herself to genius* 
But for this work something more than genius was nec- 
essary, viz., sympathy and love. In the preface to the 
first edition, he says, "In that which I here relate, and 
which I have, for the most part, seen and heard myself 
in the course of an active life, I have taken care not 
once to add my own opinion to what I saw and heard 
the people themselves saying, feeling, believing, judging, 
and attempting." In a later edition (1800) he says, "I 
desired nothing then, and I desire nothing else now, a& 
the object of my life, but the welfare of the people, 
whom I love, and whom I feel to be miserable as few 

* [A translation of the original book was published in Barnard's- 
Journal of Education, vii. 521-648. This was about one-fourth of the 
whole work as subsequently enlarged. The rest of this volume of the 
Journal is given to other extracts from Pestalozzi's works, and to remarks 
upon his teaching. An abridged translation of Leonard and Gertrude 
was published in Boston in 1885. J 



HIS BOOKS. 167 

feel them to be miserable, because I have with them 
borne their sufferings as few have borne them." 

Pestalozzi's friends now came to the conclusion that 
he had found his vocation at last, and that it was novel- 
writing; but, throughout Europe he met with many 
more discriminating readers. 

During his residence at Neuhof where he continued 
to drag on a weary and depressed existence till he had 
been there, altogether, thirty years, he published several 
works, none of which had the success of " Leonard and 
Gertrude." In 1782 appeared "Christopher and Alice,"* 
and in 1795 some fables, which he called " Figures to 
my ABC Book." But the work which gave its author 
most trouble to compose, on which, he says, he labored 
for three long years with incredible toil, and which 
when it did appear, was doomed to the most complete 
neglect, was his " Researches into the Course of Nature 
in the Development of the Human Race." 

The consequences of the French Revolution called 
Pestalozzi from his philosophical speculations. French 
troops poured into Switzerland. Everything was remod- 
eled after the French pattern. The government was 
placed in the hands of five Directors, according to the 
phase which the supreme power had then (1798) taken 
in the model country. Pestalozzi avowed himself the 
champion of the new order of things, and his pen was 
at once employed by the Directors. These men had not, 
however, the discernment of Lavater, who once told 
Madame Pestalozzi, "I would consult your husband in 
everything connected with the condition of the people, 

[* Translated extracts are given in Barnard's Journal of Education, 
Yli. 665.J 



168 JOHN HENRY TESTALOZZI. 

though I would never intrust him with a farthing of 
money." By the Directors, Pestalozzi was not con- 
sulted at all. "I wished for nothing," he said, ''but 
that the sources of the savage and degraded state 
of the people might be stopped, and the evils flow- 
ing from them arrested. The Novi Homines [new 
men] of Helvetia, w^hose wishes went further, and 
who had no knowledge of the condition of the 
people, found, of course, that I was not the man for 
them. They took every straw for a mast, by which they 
might sail the Republic to a safe shore; but me, me 
alone, they took for a stiaw not fit for a fly to cling to. 
They did me good, however — more good than any men 
have ever done me — they restored me to myself." It 
was thought that he had espoused their cause to secure 
for himself some Government appointment, and the 
Directors asked him what he would be. His answer 
was, "I will be a schoolmaster" — an answer which 
probably confirmed his friends in the opinion they had 
before expressed, that he would end his days either in 
the poor-house or the mad-house. 

Among the directors was LeGrand, who entered into 
Pestalozzi's views, and at once placed at his disposal the 
means of opening a school in Aargau: but events 
occurred which led him to another sphere of labor, and 
caused him to undertake a much more diflScult task. 
The Catholic and democratic canton of Unterwalden did 
not accept the changes which the French introduced. It 
was consequently invaded by a French army, many of 
the inhabitants were killed, and Stanz, the, caj^ital, was 
pillaged and burnt. These strong measures of their allies 
were in secret disapproved of by the Swiss Directors, 



169 

who were, therefore, anxious to do what they could to 
relieve the sufferings of their fellow-countrymen. 
Le Grand proposed to Pestalozzi to give up his other 
plans for the present, and to goto Stanz and take charge 
of the orphan and destitute children there. Pestalozzi 
was not the man to refuse such a task as this. " I went," 
lie writes. " I would have gone into the remotest clefts 
of the mountains to come nearer my aim, and now I 
really did come nearer." 

He established himself with no assistants, and with 
only one servant, in a convent which was building for 
the Ursulines. There was but one room fit for occupa- 
tion when he arrived. Children came flocking in, many 
of whom were orphans, and could not be otherwise pro- 
vided for. The one room became a school-room and a 
dormitory for Pestalozzi and as many children as it 
would hold. There were soon eighty under Pestalozzi's 
charge during the day, some of the neighbors taking in 
children to sleep. Of the eighty, many were beggar 
children, not accustomed to any control, vicious in their 
habits, and afflicted with loathsome diseases. Those 
who had been better off were helpless and exacting. 
And for all these, Pestalozzi, then over fifty years of 
age, undertook the management, the clothing, feeding, 
teaching, and even the performance of the most menial 
offices. The parents, who looked upon him as the paid 
official of a hated government, and, moreover, distrusted 
him as a Protestant, annoyed him in every way they 
could, and encouraged the children in disorder and dis- 
content. And yet the Protestant was giving an exam- 
ple of love and self-sacrifice worthy of the noblest saint 
in the Calendar. This love did not lose its reward. By 



1*70 JOHN HENRY PESTALOZZI. 

degrees it gained him the affection of the children, and 
introduced harmony and order into the chaos which at 
first surrounded him. 

The very disadvantages in which he was placed drove 
him to discoveries he would never otherwise have made. 
His whole school apparatus consisted of himself and his 
pupils; so he studied the children themselves, their 
wants and capacities. " I stood in the midst of them," he 
says, " pronouncing various sounds, and asking the chil- 
dren to imitate them. Whoever saw it was struck with 
the effect. It is true it was like a meteor which vanishes 
in the air as soon as it appears. No one understood its 
nature. I did not understand it myself. It was the re- 
sult of a simple idea, or rather, of a fact of human 
nature, which was revealed to my feelings, but of which 
I was far from having a clear consciousness." Again he 
says, *' Being obliged to instruct the children by myself, 
without any assistance, I learnt the art of teaching a 
great number together; and as I had no other means of 
bringing the instruction before them than that of pro- 
nouncing everything to them loudly and distinctly, I 
was naturally led to the idea of making them draw, 
write, or work all at the same time. 

" The confusion of so many voices repeating my words 
suggested the necessity of keeping time in our exercises? 
and I soon found that this contributed materially to 
make their impressions stronger and more distinct. 
Their total ignorance forced me to dwell a long time on 
the simplest elements, and I was thus led to perceive 
how much higher a degree of interest and power is ob- 
tained by a persevering attention to the elementary 
parts until they be perfectly familiar to the mind; and 



ORIGIN OF "object LESSONS." lYB 

what coufideuce and interest the child is inspired with 
by the consciousness of complete and perfect attain- 
ment, even in the lowest stage of instruction. Never 
before had I so deeply felt the important bearing which 
the first elements of every branch of knowledge have 
upon its complete outline, and what immense deficiencies 
in the final result of it must arise from the confusion 
and imperfection of the simplest beginnings. To bring 
these to maturity and perfection in the child's mind be- 
came now a main object of my attention; and the suc- 
cess far surpassed my expectations. The consciousness 
of energies hitherto unknown to themselves was rapidly 
developed in the children, and a general sense of order 
and harmony began to prevail among them. They felt 
their own powers, and the tediousness of the common^ 
school tone vanished like a specter from the room. They 
were determined to try, they succeeded; they perse- 
vered, they accomplished and were delighted. Their 
mood was not that of laborious learning, it was the joy 
of unknown powers aroused from sleep; their hearts and 
minds were elevated by the anticipation of what their 
powers would enable them to attempt and to effect." 

Of course his first difficulty was to arrest the attention 
of a great number of children. This he overcame by ap- 
pealing to their senses. Combining this experience with 
the ideas he had received many years before from Rous- 
seau, he invented his system of object-lessons. He was 
also driven by his needs to something like a system of 
monitors, though in an informal way. If a child was 
found to know anything he was put between two others 
to whom he might teach it. 

Thus, during the short period, not more than a yearj. 



172 JOHN HENEY PESTALOZZI. 

which Pestalozzi spent among the children at Stanz, he 
settled the main features of the Pestalozzian system. 

Sickness broke out among the children, and the wear 
and tear was too great even for Pestalozzi. He would 
probably have sunk under his efforts if the French, 
pressed by the Austrians, had not entered Stanz, in Jan- 
uary, 1799, and taken part of the Ursuline Convent for 
a military hospital. Pestalozzi was, therefore, obliged 
to break up the school, and he himself went to a medi- 
cinal spring on the Gurnigel in the Canton Bern. 
"Here," he says, "I enjoyed days of recreation. I 
needed them. It is a wonder that I am still alive. I 
shall not forget those days as long as I live ; they saved 
me: but I could not live without my work." He came 
down from the Gurnigel, and began to teach in the pri- 
mary schools (i. e., schools for children from four to 
eight years old) of Burgdorf, the second town in the 
Canton. Here the director was jealous of him, and he 
met with much opposition. " It was whispered,'^ he tells 
us, " that I myself could not write nor work accounts, 
nor even read properly. Popular reports," he adds, 
" are not always entirely wrong. It is true I could not 
write nor read nor work accounts well." 

A strange account has been left us of his teaching in 
the school by Ramsauer, then a scholar in it, and after- 
ward one of Pestalozzi's assistants: — 

" I got about as much regular schooling as the other 
scholars," he writes — "that is, none at all; but Pesta- 
lozzi's sacred zeal, his devoted love, which caused him 
to be entirely unmindful of himself, his serious and de- 
pressed state of mind, which struck even the children, 
made the deepest impression on me, and knit my child- 



173 

like and grateful heart to his forever. Pestalozzi's in- 
tention was, that all the instruction given in this school 
should start from form, number, and language, and 
should have constant reference to these elements. He 
taught nothing but drawing, ciphering, and exercises in 
language. . . . He had not patience to allow things 
to be gone over a second time, or to put questions (in 
arithmetic), and in his enormous zeal for the instruction 
of the whole school, he seemed not to concern himself 
in the slightest degree for the individual scholar. The 
best things we had with him were the exercises in lan> 
guage, at least those which he gave us on the paper- 
hangings of the school-room, which were real exercises 
in observation. ' Boys,' he would say (he never named 
the girls), ' what do you see ? ' Answer — *A hole in the 
wainscot.' Pestalozzi — 'Very good. Now repeat after 
me — I see a hole in the wainscot. I see^a long hole in 
the wainscot. Through the hole I see the wall. Through 
the long narrow hole I see the wall,' and so forth. As 
Pestalozzi, in his zeal, did not tie himself to any particu- 
lar time, we generally went on until eleven o'clock with 
whatever we had commenced at eight, and by ten 
o'clock he was always tired and hoarse. We knew when 
it was eleven by the noise of the other scliool children 
in the street, and then we usually all ran out without 
bidding good-bye." 

After this account of Pestalozzi's instruction, we can 
hardly wonder that the school rector at Burgdorf was 
not grateful for his assistance. 

In less than a year Pestalozzi left this school in 
bad health, and joined Kriisi in opening a new school 
in Burgdorf Castle, for which he afterward (1802) ob- 



114 JOHN HENRY PESTALOZZI. 

tained Government aid. Here he was assisted in carry- 
ing out his system by Kriisi, Tobler, and Bluss. He 
now embodied the results of his experience in a work 
-which has obtained great celebrity — "How Gertrude 
Teaches her Children," 

In 1802 Pestalozzi, for once in his life a successful and 
popular man, was elected a member of a deputation sent 
by the Swiss people to Paris. 

On the restoration of the Cantons in 1804, the Castle 
of Burgdorf was again occupied by one of the chief 
magistrates, and Pestalozzi and his establishment were 
moved to the Monastery of Buchsee. Here the teachers 
gave the principal direction to another, the since cele- 
brated Fellenburg, " not without my consent," says Pes- 
talozzi. "but to my profound mortification." He therefore 
soon accepted an invitation from the inhabitants of 
Yverdun to open an institution there, and within a 
twelvemonth he was followed by his old assistants, who 
had found government by Fellenburg less to their taste 
than no-government by Pestalozzi. 

The Yverdun Institute had soon a world-wide reputa- 
tion. Pestalozzian teachers went from it co Madrid, to 
Naples, to St. Petersburg. Kings and philosophers 
joined in doing it honor. But, as Pestalozzi himself has 
testified, these praises were but as a laurel-wreath en- 
circling a skull. The life of the Pestalozzian institutions 
had been the love which the old man had infused into 
all the members, teachers as well as children; but this 
life was wanting at Yverdun. The establishment was 
much too large to be carried on successfully without 
more method and discipline than Pestalozzi, remarkable, 
as he himself says, for his " unrivalled incapacity to gov- 



THE YVERDUN INSTITUTE. 175 

ern," was master of. The assistants began each to take 
his own line, and even the outward show of unity was 
soon at an end. Nothing is less interesting or profitable 
than the details of bygone quarrels, so I will not go into 
the great feud between Niederer and Schmid, which in 
its day made a good deal of noise in the scholastic world, 
as even less important disputes have done, and will do 
in the world at large. There were, too, many mistakes 
made at Yverdun. Pestalozzi was mad with enthusiasm 
to improve elementary education, especially for the poor, 
throughout Europe. His zeal led him to announce his 
schemes and methods before he had given them a fair 
trial; hence many foolish things came abroad as Pesta- 
lozzianism, and hindered the reception of principles and 
practices which better deserved the name. Pestalozzi, too, 
unfortunately thought that his influence depended on the 
opinion which was formed of his institution; so he pub- 
lished a highly-colored account of it, and tried to conceal 
its defects from the strangers by whom he was constantly 
visited. " His highly active imagination," says Raumer, 
himself for some time an inmate of the institution, " led 
him to see and describe as actually existing whatever 
he hoped sooner or later to realize." Tbe enemies of 
change made the most of these discrepancies, and this, 
joined with financial difficulties consequent on Pestaloz- 
zi's mismanagement, and with the scandals which arose 
out of the dissensions of the Pestalozzians, brought his 
institution to a speedy and unhonored close. 

Thus the sun went down in clouds, and the old man, 
when he died at the age of eighty, in 1827, had seen the 
apparent failure of all his toils. He had not, however, 
failed in reality. It has been said of him that his true 



176 JOHN HENRY PESTALOZZI. 

function was to educate ideas, not children, and when 
twenty years later the centenary of his birth was cele- 
brated by schoolmasters, not only in his native country, 
but throughout Germany, it was found that Pestalozzian 
ideas had been sown, and were bearing fruit, over the 
greater part of central Europe. 



PESTALOZZIANISM. 

As it seems to the present writer, the worst part of 
our educational course — the part which is wrong in 
theory and pernicious in practice — is our instruction of 
children, say between the ages of seven and twelve. 
Before seven years old, there is often no formal instruc- 
tion, and* perhaps there should be none. Pestalozzi 
would have children systematically taught from the 
cradle; but I can not help doubting the wisdom, or at 
least the necessity of this. Nature offers the succession 
of impressions to the child's senses without any regular 
order. Art should come to her assistance, says Pesta- 
lozzi, and organize a connected series of such impres- 
sions. It may well be questioned, however, if the child 
will be benefited by being put through any course of the 
kind. Lord Lytton wittily, and in my opinion wisely, 
applies to this subject the story of the man who thought 
his bees would make honey faster, if instead of going in 
search of flowers, they were shut up and had the flowers 
brought to them. The way in which children turn from 
object to object, like the bees from flower to flower, is 



CHILDHOOD VS. YOUTH. Ill 

surely an indication to us that Nature herself teaches 
at this age by an infinite variety of impressions which 
we should no more attempt to throw into what we call 
regular order than we should employ a drill-sergeant to 
teach infants to walk. Of course I do not mean that 
there is no education for childreu, however young; but 
the school is the mother's knee, and the lessons learnt 
there are other and more valuable than object-lessons.* 

The time for teaching, technically so called, comes at 
last, and what is to be done then ? Let us consider briefly 
what is done. 

There are in education few maxims which are so uni- 
versally accepted as this — that education is, if not 
wholly, at least in a great measure, the development of 
faculties rather than the imparting of knowledge. On 
this principle alone is it possible to justify the amount of 
time given by the higher forms in schools and by under- 
graduates at the Universities to the study of classics and 
mathematics. In all the attempts which have been made 
to depreciate these studies, no one of any authority has 
disputed that, if they are indeed the best means of train- 
ing the mind, they should be maintained in their present 
monopoly, even though the knowledge acquired were 
sure to drop off, "like the tadpole's tail," when the 
scholars entered on the business of life. We are agreed, 
then, that in youth the faculties are to be trained, not 
the knowledge given, for adult age. But when we come 
to childhood \^ e forget this principle entirely, and think 
not so much of cultivating the faculties for youth as of 
communicating the knowledge which will then come in 

* See, however, some observations of Mr. Herbert Spencer on the other 
^ae— Education, pp. 81, ff. 
K 



178 PESTALOZZIANISM. 

useful. We see clearly enough that it would be absurd 
to cram the mind of a youth with laws of science or art or 
commerce which he could not understand, on the ground 
that the getting-up of these things might save him 
trouble in after-life. But we do not hesitate to sacrifice 
childhood to the learning by heart of grammar-rules, 
Latin declensions, historical dates, and the like, with no 
thought whatever of the child's faculties, but simply 
with a view of giving him knowledge (if knowledge it 
can be called) that will come in useful five or six years 
afterward. We do not treat youths thus, probably be- 
cause we have more sympathy with tiiem, or at least 
understand them better. The intellectual life to which 
the senses and the imaginations are subordinated in the 
man, has already begun in the youth. In an inferior de- 
gree he can do what the man can do, and understand 
what the man can understand. He has already some 
notion of reasoning, and abstraction, and generalization. 
But with the child it is very different. His active facul- 
ties may be said almost to differ in kind from man's. 
He has a feeling for the sensuous world which he will 
lose as he grows up. His strong imagination, under no 
control of the reason, is constantly at work building cas- 
tles in the air, and investigating the doll or the puppet- 
show with all the properties of the things they repre- 
sent. His feelings and affections, easily excited, find an 
object to love or dislike in every person and thing he 
meets with. On the other hand, he has no conception 
of what is abstract, and no interest except in actual 
known persons, animals, and things. 

There is, then, between the child of nine and the 
youth of fourteen and fifteen a greater difference than 



THE PREPARATORY SCHOOL. 179 

l^etween the youth and the man of twenty; and this de- 
mands a corresponding difference in their studies. And 
yet, as matters are carried on now, the child is too often 
kept to the drudgery of learning by rote mere collec- 
tions of hard words, perhaps, too, in a foreign language; 
and absorbed by the present, he gets little comfort from 
the teacher's h(Bc olim meminisse juvahit [perhaps some time 
it will be a pleasure to remember these things] . 

How to educate the child is doubtless the most diffi- 
cult problem of all, and it is generally allotted to those 
who are the least likely to find a satisfactory solution. 

The earliest educator of the children of many rich 
parents is the nursemaid — a person not usually distin- 
guished by either intellectual or moral excellence. At 
an early age, this educator is superseded by the Pre- 
paratory School. Taken as a body, the ladies whose 
pecuniary needs compel them to open " establishments 
for young gentlemen" (though doubtless possessed of 
many excellent qualities) can not be said to hold en- 
larged views, or indeed any views whatever on the sub- 
ject of education. Their intention is not so much to 
cultivate the children's faculties as to make a livelihood, 
and to hear no complaints that pupils who have left 
them have been found deficient in the expected knowl- 
edge by the master of their new school. If any one 
would investigate the sort of teaching which is con- 
sidered adapted to the capacity of children at this stage, 
let him look into a standard work still in vogue 
("Mangnall's Questions"), from which the young of 
both sexes acquire a great quantity and variety of learn- 
ing; the whole of ancient and modern history and biog- 
raphy, together with the heathen mythology, the 



180 . PESTALOZZIANISM. 

planetary system, and the names of all the constellations^ 
lying very compactly in about 300 pages. 

Unfortunately, moreover, from the gentility of these 
ladies, their scholars' bodies are often treated in pre-^ 
paratory schools no less injuriously than their minds. 
It may be natural in a child to use his lungs and de- 
light in noise, but this can hardly be considered genteel^ 
so the tendency is, as far as possible, suppressed. It is 
found, too, that if children are allowed to run about 
they get dirty and spoil their clothes, and do not look 
like " young gentlemen," so they are made to take 
exercise in a much more genteel fashion, walking slowly 
two-and-two, with gloves on. 

At nine or ten years old, boys are commonly put to a 
school taught by masters. Here they lose sight of their 
gloves, and learn the use of their limbs; but their minds 
are not so fortunate as their bodies. The studies of the 
school have been arranged without any thought of their 
peculiar needs. The youngest class is generally the 
largest, often much the largest, and it is handed over to 
the least competent and worst paid master on the staft 
of teachers. The reason is, that little boys are found to 
learn the tasks imposed upon them very slowly. A 
youth or man who came fresh to the Latin grammar 
would learn in a morning as much as the master, with 
great labor, can get into children in a week. It is 
thought, therefore, that the best teaching should be ap- 
plied where it will have most result. If any one were 
to say to the manager of a school, " The master wha 
takes the lowest form teaches badly, and the children 
learn nothing;" he would perhaps say, "Very likely; 
but if I paid a much higher salary, and got a better 



ITS DISTINCTIVE FEATURE. 181 

man, they would learn but little." The only thing the 
school-manager thinks of is, How much do the little 
l^oys learn of what is taught in the higher forms ? How 
their faculties are being developed, or whether they 
have any faculties except for reading, writing, and 
arithmetic, and for getting grammar rules, etc., by 
heart, he is not so " unpractical " as to inquire. 

Pestalozzi, it has been said, invented nothing new. 
Most assuredly he did not invent the principle that edu- 
<;ation is a developing of the faculties rather than an im- 
parting of knowledge. But he did much to bring this 
truth to bear on early education, and to make it not 
only received but acted on. 

Much has been written about the amount of originality 
which may be allowed to Pestalozzi, but the question is, 
after all, of no great importance. We must, at least, 
<joncede to him, the merit which he himself claims, of 
having " lighted upon truths little noticed before, and 
principles which, though almost generally acknowledged, 
were seldom carried out in practice."* As Sydney 
Smith said of Hamilton, "his must be the credit of the 
man who is so deeply impressed with the importance of 
what he thinks he has discovered that he will take no 
-denial, but, at the risk of fame and fortune, pushes 
through all opposition, and is determined the discovery 
shall not perish, at least for want of a fair trial. " 

But Pestalozzi is distinguished from other educators 
not more by what he did, than by what he endeavored 
to do; in other words, his differentia [distinguishing char- 
acteristic] is rather his aim than his method. 

* Letters on Early Education, vl. 23. 



182 PESTALOZZIANISM. 

If we seek for the root of Pestalozzi's system we shall 
find it, I think, in that which was the motive power of 
Pestalozzi's career, " the enthusiasm of humanity." Con- 
sumed with grief for the degradation of the Swiss 
peasantry, he never lost faith in their true dignity as 
men, and in the possibility of raising them to a condition 
worthy of it. He cast about for the best means of thus 
raising them, and decided that it could be effected, not by 
any improvement in their outward circumstances, but by 
an education which should make them what their Cre- 
ator intended them to be, and should give them the use 
and the consciousness of all their inborn faculties. 
"From my youth up," he says, " T felt what a high and 
indispensable human duty it is to labor for the poor and 
miserable; . . . that he may attain to a conscious- 
ness of his own dignity through his feeling of the uni- 
versal powers and endowments which he possesses 
awakened within him; that he may not only learn to 
gabble by rote the religious maxim that * man is created 
in the image of God, and is bound to live and die as a 
child of God,' but may himself experience its truth by 
virtue of the Divine power within him, so that he may 
be raised, not only above the plowing oxen, but also- 
above the man in purple and silk who lives unworthily 
of his high destiny."* 

Again he says (and I quote at length on the point, as 
it is indeed the key to Pestalozzianism), " Why have I 
insisted so strongly on attention to early physical and 
intellectual education ? Because I consider these as 
merely leading to a higher aim, to qualify the human 

* Quoted in Barnard, p. 13. [See note, page 194.] 



THE "enthusiasm OF HUMANITY." 183 

being for the free and full use of all the faculties im- 
planted by the Creator, and to direct all these faculties 
toward the perfection of the whole being of man, that 
he may be enabled to act in his peculiar station as an 
instrument of that All-wise and Almighty Power that 
has called him into life."* 

Believing in this high aim of education, Pestalozzi 
required a proper early training for all alike. " Every 
human being," said he, " has a claim to a judicious devel- 
opment of his faculties by those to whom the care of his 
infancy is confided."f 

Pestaloizi therefore most earnestly addressed himself 
to mothers, to convince them of the power placed in 
their hands, and to teach them how to use it. " The 
mother is qualified, and qualified by the Creator Himself, 
to become the principal agent in the development of her 
child; . . . and what is demanded of her is — Si think- 
ing love. . . . God has given to thy child all the 
faculties of our nature, but the grand point remains un- 
decided — how shall this heart, this head, these hands, 
be employed ? to whose service shall they be dedi- 
cated ? A question the answer to which involves 
a futurity of happiness or misery to a life so dear to 
thee. . . . It is recorded that God opened the heav- 
ens to the patriarch of old, and showed him a ladder 
leading thither. This ladder is let down to every de- 
scendant of Adam; it is offered to thy child. But he 
must be taught to climb it. And let him not attempt 
it by the cold calculations of the head, or the mere 

* Letters on Early Education, xxxii, 160. 

t Ibid, xxxii. p, 163. For the very striking passage which follows, see 
Note on p. 191 infra. 



184 PESTALOZZIAMSM. I 

impulse of the heart; but let all these powers combine, 
and the noble enterprise will be crowned with success, i 
These powers are already bestowed on him, but to thee ■ 
it is given to assist in calling them forth."* " Maternal 
love is the first agent in education. . . . Through 
it the child is led to love and trust his Creator and his 
Redeemer." 

From the theory of development which lay at the 
root of Pestalozzi's views of education, it followed that 
the imparting of knowledge and the training for special 
pursuits held only a subordinate position in his scheme. 
*' Education, instead of merely considering what is to be 
imparted to children, ought to consider first what they 
may be said already to possess, if not as a developed, at 
least as an involved faculty capable of development. 
Or if, instead of speaking thus in the abstract, we will 
but recollect that it is to the great Author of life that man 
owes the possession, and is responsible for the use, of 
his innate faculties, education should not only decide 
what is to be made of a child, but rather inquire, what 
it was intended that he should become. What is his 
destiny as a created and responsible being ? What are 
his faculties as a rational and moral being? What are 
the means for their perfection, and the end held out as 
the highest object of their efforts by the Almighty 
Father of all, both in creation and in the page of revela- 
tion ? " 

Education, then, must consist " in a continual benevo- 
lent superintendence, with the object of calling forth all 
the faculties which Providence has implanted; and its 
province, thus enlarged, will yet be with less difficulty 

* Letters on Early Education, v. 21. 



DEVELOPMENT OF THE FACITLTIES. 185 

surveyed from one point of view, and will have more of 
a systematic and truly philosophical character, than an 
incoherent mass of exercises — arranged without unity of 
principle, and gone through without interest — which 
too often usurps its name." 

An education of the latter description he denounced 
with the zeal of a Luther. 

"The present race of schoolmasters," he writes, " sac- 
rifice the essence of true teaching to separate and dis- 
connected teaching in a complete jumble of subjects. 
By dishing up fragments of all kinds of truths, they 
destroy the s])irit of truth itself, and extinguish the 
power of self-dependence which without that spirit can 
not exist."* 

With Pestalozzi teaching was not so much to be 
thought of as training. Training must be found for the 
child's heart, head, and hand, and the capacities of the 
heart and head must be developed by practice no less 
than those of the hand. The heart, as we have seen, is 
first influenced by the mother. At a later period Pesta- 
lozzi would have the charities of the family circle intro- 
duced into the school-room (rather ignoring the differ- 
ence which the altered ratio of the young to the adults 
makes in the conditions of the problem), and would 
have the child taught virtue by his affections being ex- 
ercised and his benevolence guided to action. There is 
an interesting instance on record of the way in which 
he himself applied this principle. When he was at 
Stanz, news arrived of the destruction of Altdorf. 
Pestalozzi depicted to his scholars the misery of the 
children there. " Hundreds," said he, " are at this mo- 



* Quoted by Carl Schmidt, Gesch. d. Paed., iv. 87. 



186 PESTALOZZIANISM. 

ment wandering about as you were last year, without a 
home, perhaps without food or clothing." He then 
asked them if they would not wish to receive some of 
these children among them ? This, of course, they were 
eager to do. Pestalozzi then pointed out the sacrifices 
it would involve on their part, that they would have to 
share everything with the new comers, and to eat less 
and work more than before. Only when they promised 
to make these sacrifices ungrudgingly, he undertook to 
apply to Government that the children's wish might be 
granted. It was thus that Pestalozzi endeavored to de- 
velop the moral and religious life of the children, which 
is based on trust and love. 

The child's thinking faculty is capable, according to 
Pestalozzi, of being exercised almost from the com- 
mencement of consciousness. Indeed, it has been ob- 
jected against Pestalozzi's system that he cultivated the 
mere intellectual powers at the expense of the poetical 
and imaginative. All knowledge, he taught, is acquired 
by sensation and observation: sometimes it has been 
thought that he traces everything originally to the 
senses; but he seems to extend the word Anschauung^ 
[contemplation] to every experience of which the mind 
becomes conscious.* 



* I dare say I am not the only English reader of German books who 
has been perplexed by the words Anschauung and anschauUch. Shel- 
ling's definition is as follows: "Anschauung ist jene Handlung de» 
Geistes in welcher er aus ThStigkeit und Leiden, aus unbeschrankter und 
beschrfinkter Thatigkeit, in sich selbst ein gemeinschaftliches Produkt 
schafft," [Anschauung is every action of the mind in which it creates out 
of action and passion, out of unlimited and limited action, a distinct 
product upon itself ]. The word seems used, in fact, for the mind's be- 
coming conscious of any fact immediately by experience, in contradis- 
tinction to inferences from symbols. To make instruction anschauUch, 
therefore, is to make the learner acquire knowledge by his direct expe- 
riences. 



STIMULUS TO SELF- ACTIVITY. IST 

The child, then, must be made to observe accurately, 
and to reflect on its observations. The best subject- 
matter for the lessons will be the most ordinary things 
that can be found. "Not only is there not one of the 
little incidents in the life of a child, in his amusements 
and recreations, in his relation to his parents, and 
friends, and playfellows; but there is actually not any- 
thing within the reach of a child's attention, whether it 
belong to nature or to the employments and arts of life, 
that may not be made the object of a lesson by which 
some useful knowledge may be imparted, and, what is 
still more important, by which the child may not be 
familiarized with the habit of thinking on what he sees, 
and speaking after he has thought. The mode of doing 
this is not by any means to talk much to the child, but 
to enter into conversation with a child; not to address 
to him many words, however familiar and well chosen, 
but to bring him to express himself on the subject; not 
to exhaust the subject, but to question the child about 
it, and let him find out and correct the answers. It 
would be ridiculous to expect that the volatile spirits of 
a child could be brought to follow any lengthy explana- 
tions. The attention is deadened by long expositions, 
but roused by animated questions. Let these questions 
be short, clear, and intelligible. Let them not merely 
lead the child to repeat in the same, or in varied terms, 
what he has heard just before. Let them excite him to 
observe what is before him, to recollect what he has 
learned, and to muster his little stock of knowledge for 
materials for an answer. Show him a certain quality in 
one thing, and let him find out the same in others. Tell 
him that the shape of a ball is called round, and if, ac- 



188 PESTALOZZIANISM. 

cordingly, you bring him to point out other objects to 
which the same property belongs, you have employed ; 
him more usefully than by the most perfect discourse 
on rotundity. In the one instance he would have had 
to listen and to recollect, in the other he has to observe 
and to think." * " From observation and memory there 
is only one step to reflection. Though imperfect, this 
operation is often found among the early exercises of 
the infant mind. The powerful stimulus of inquisitive- 
Bess prompts to exertions which, if successful or en- 
couraged by others, will lead to a habit of thought."f 
i Words, which are the signs of things, must never be 
I taught the child till he has grasped the idea of the 
' thing signified. 

When an oV)ject has been submitted to his senses, he 
must be led to the consciousness of the impressions pro- 
duced, and then must be taught the name of the object 
and of the qualities producing those impressions. Last 
of all, he must ascend to the definition of the object. 

The object-lessons Pestalozzi divided into three great 
classes, under the heads of — (1) Form; (2) Number; 
(3) Speech. It was his constant endeavor to make his 
pupils distinguish between essentials and accidentals, 
and with his habit of constant analysis, which seems 
pushed to an extreme that to children would be repuls- 
ive, he sought to reduce Form, Number, and Speech to 
their elements. In his alphabet of Form everything 
was represented as having the square as its base. In 
Number all operations were traced back to 1 + 1. In 
Speech the children, in their very cradles, were to be 

♦ Letters on Early Education, xxxi\. 147. 
tibid. XX. 92. 



CLASSIFICATION OF OBJECT-LESSONS. 189 

taught the elem ents of sound, as ba, ba, ba, da, da, da, ma, 
ma, ma, etc. This elementary teaching Pestalozzi con- 
sidered of the greatest importance, and when he him- 
self instructed he went over the ground very slowly. 
Buss tells us that when he first joined Pestalozzi the de- 
lay over the prime elements seemed to him a waste of 
time, but that afterward he was convinced of its being 
the right plan, and felt that the failure of his own edu- 
cation was due to its incoherent and. desultory character. 
**Not only," says Pestalozzi, "have the first elements of 
knowledge in every subject the most important bearing 
on its complete outline, but the child's confidence and 
interest are gained by perfect attainment even in the 
lowest stage of instruction." By his object-lessons Pes- 
talozzi aimed at — 1, enlarging gradually the sphere of 
a child's intuition, i. e., increasing the number of ob- 
jects falling under his immediate perception; 2, impress- 
ing upon him those perceptions of which he had become 
conscious, with certainty, clearness, and precision; 3, 
imparting to him a comprehensive knowledge of lan- 
guage for the expression of whatever had become or 
was becoming an object of his consciousness, in conse- 
quence either of the spontaneous impulse of his own 
nature, or of the assistance of tuition. 

Of all the instruction given at Yverdun, the most 
successful, in the opinion of those who visited the 
school, was the instruction in arithmetic. ' The children 
are described as performing with great rapidity very 
difficult tasks in head-calculation. Pestalozzi based his 
method here, as in other subjects, on the principle that 
the individual should be brought to knowledge by a road 
similar to that which the whole race had used in found- 



190 PESTALOZZIANISM. 

ing the science. Actual counting of things preceded the 
first Cocker, as actual measuring of land preceded the 
original Euclid. The child then must be taught to count 
things, and to find out the various processes experi- 
mentally in the concrete before he is given any abstract 
rule, or is put to any abstract exercises. This plan is 
now commonly adopted in German schools, and many 
ingenious contrivances have been introduced by which 
the combinations of things can be presented to the chil- 
dren's sight. 

Next to the education of the affections and the intel- 
lect come those exercises in which the body is more 
prominent. I do not know that there was anything dis- 
tinctive in Pestalozzi's views and practices in physical 
education, although he attached the due importance to 
it which had previously been perceived only by Locke 
and Rousseau, and in Germany by Basedow and his 
colleagues of the Philanthropin. 

Great pains should be taken with the cultivation of 
the senses, and finally the artistic faculty [Kunstcraft) 
should be developed, in which the power of the mind 
and that of the senses are united. Music and drawing 
played a leading part in Pestalozzi's schools. They were 
taught to all the children, even the youngest, and were 
not limited to the conventional two hours a week. It is 
natural to children to imitate; thus they acquire lan- 
guage, and thus, with proper diction and encouragement, 
they will find pleasure in attempting to sing the melo- 
dies they hear, and to draw the simple objects around 
them. By drawing, the eye is trained as well as the 
hand. "A person who is in the habit of drawing, espe- 
cially from nature, will easily perceive many circum- 



STUDY MOEE THAN AMUSEMENT. 191 

stances which are commonly overlooked, and will form a 
much more correct impression, even of such objects as 
be does not stop to examine minutely, than one who has 
never been taught to look upon what he sees with an 
intention of reproducing a likeness of it. The attention 
to the exact shape of the whole, and the proportion of 
the parts, which is requisite for the taking of an ade- 
quate sketch, is converted into a habit, and becomes pro- 
ductive both of instruction and amusement." * 

Besides drawing, Pestalozzi recommended modeling, 
a hint which was afterward worked out by Froebel in 
his Kindergarten. 

Differing from Locke and Basedow, Pestalozzi was no 
friend to the notion of giving instruction always in the 
guise of amusement. *' I am convinced," says he, "that 
such a notion will forever preclude solidity of knowledge, 
and, from want of sufficient exertions on the part of the 
pupils, will lead to that very result which I wish to 
avoid by my principle of a constant employment of the 
thinking powers. A child must very early in life be 
taught the lesson that exertion is indispensable for the 
attainment of knowledge." But a cMld should not be 
taught to look upon exertion as an evil. He should be 
encouraged, not frightened into it. "An interest in 
study is the first thing which a teacher should endeavor 
to excite and keep alive. There are scarcely any cir- 
cumstances in which a want of application in children 
does not proceed from a want of interest; and there are 
perhaps none in which the want of interest does not 
originate in the mode of teaching adopted by the teach- 

* Letters on Early Education, xxiv. 117. 



192 PESTALOZZIANISM. 

er. I would go so far as to lay it down as a rule, that 
whenever children are inattentive and apparently take 
no interest in a lesson, the teacher should always first 
look to himself for the reason. . . . Could we con- 
ceive the indescribable tedium which must oppress the 
young mind while the weary hours are slowly passing 
away one after another in occupations which it can 
neither relish nor understand, could we remember 
the like scenes which our own childhood has passed 
through, we should no longer be surprised at the remiss- 
ness of the school-boy, 'creeping like snail unwillingly 
to school.' ... To change all this, ' we must adopt 
a better mode of instruction, by which the children are 
less left to themselves, less thrown upon the unwelcome 
employment of passive listening, less harshly treated for 
little excusable failings; but more roused by questions^ 
animated by illustrations, interested and won by kind- 
ness. 

"There is a most remarkable reciprocal action be- 
tween the interest which the teacher takes and that 
which he communicates to his pupils. If he is not with 
his whole mind present at the subject, if he does not care 
whether he is understood or not, whether his manner is 
liked or not, he will alienate the affections of his pupils, 
and render them indifferent to what he says. But real 
interest taken in tl^e task of instruction — kind words and 
kinder feelings — the very expression of the features, and 
the glance of the eye, are never lost upon children."* 

In conclusion, T would ask. Have English school-mas- 
ters nothing to learn from Pestalozzi ? Do they aim at 

* i.etters on Early Education, xxx. 150. 



LESSONS FOR US TO LEARN. 193 

a plan of education which shall be founded on a knowl- 
edge of human nature, and at modes of instruction 
which shall develop their pupil's faculties? Perhaps 
some will be inclined to answer, " Fine words no doubt, 
and in a sense very true, that education should be the 
unfolding of the faculties according to the Divine idea; 
but between this high poetical theory and the dull prose 
of actual school-teaching, there is a great gulf fixed, 
and we can not attend to both at the same time." I 
know full well how different theories and plans of edu- 
cation seem to us when we are at leisure and can think 
of them without reference to particular pupils, and when 
all our energy is taxed to get through our day's teach- 
ing, and our animal spirits jaded by having to keep 
order and exact attention among veritable schoolboys 
who do not answer in all respects to "the young "of the 
theorists. But whilst admitting most heartily the dif- 
ference here, as elsewhere, between the actual and the 
ideal, I think that the dull prose of school-teaching 
would be less dull and less prosaic if our aim was higher, 
and if we did not contentedly assume that our present 
performances are as good as the nature of the case will 
admit of. Many teachers (I think I might say most) are 
discontented with the greater number of their pupils, 
but it is not so usual for teachers to be discontented 
with themselves. And yet even those who are most 
averse from theoretical views, which they call unpracti- 
cal, would admit, as practical men, that their methods 
are probably susceptible of improvement, and that even 
if their methods are right, they themselves are by no 
means perfect teachers. Only let the desire of improve- 
ment once exist, and the teacher will find a new interest 

L 



194 PESTALOZZIANISM. 

in his work. In part, the treadmill-like monotony so 
wearing to the spirits will be done away, and he will at 
times have the encouragement of conscious progress. To 
a man thus minded, theorists may be of great assistance. 
His practical knowledge may, indeed, often show him 
the absurdity of some pompously enunciated principle, 
and even where the principles seem sound, he may smile 
at the applications. But the theorist will show him many 
aspects of his profession, and will lead him to make many 
observations in it, which would otherwise have escaped 
him. They will save him from a danger caused by the 
difficulty of getting anything done in the schoolroom, 
the danger of thinking more of means than ends. They 
will teach him to examine what his aim really is, and 
then whether he is using the most suitable methods to 
accomplish it. 

Such a theorist is ^Pestalozzi. He points to a high 
ideal, and bids us measure our modes of education by 
it. Let us not forget that if we are practical men we 
are Christians, and as such the ideal set before us is the 
highest of all. " Be ye perfect, even as your Father in 
heaven is perfect."* 

* Raumer reckons up the services Pestalozzi did for education as fol- 
lows: "He compelled the scholastic world to revise the whole of their 
task, to reflect on the nature and destiny of man, and also on the proper 
way of leading him from his youth toward that destiny." Those who 
wish to study Pestalozzi and his works will find a mass of information, 
thrown together without any apparent attempt at method, in Henry Bar- 
nard's " Pestalozzi and Pestalozzianism." New York, 1859. [This book is 
no longer published, but it was mainly a reprint from the " American 
Journal of Education," Vol. VI, already referred to.J This volume con- 
tains Tilleard's translation of Raumer's *'Pestalozzi," excerpted from the 
" Geschichte der Padagogik," and published in this country. Besides 
this, Barnard gives us sketches of Pestalozzi's principal assistants, a 
translation of " Lienhard und Gertrud," and long extracts from his other 



BIELTOGRAPHY. 195 

writings. I have used chiefly Barnard and Dr. Biber's Life, also article 
by Palmer in C. A. Schmid's Encyclopaedie. An important work (accord- 
ing to Barnard, I have not seen it myself) is E. Christoffel's " Pestalozzis 
Leben und Ansichten in wortgetreuen Auszugen seiner gesammten 
Schriften." Ziirich, 1847. The little volume of " Letters on Early Educa- 
tion, addressed to Mr. Greaves," was last published in the "Phoenix Li- 
brary." I have made many quotations from these letters above, and will 
conclude with this striking passage : "Whenever we find a human being in a 
state of suffering, and near to the awful moment which is forever to close 
the scene of his pains and enjoyments in this world, we feel ourselves 
moved by a sympathy which reminds us, that, however low his earthly 
condition, here too there is one of our race, subject to the same sensa- 
tions of alternate joy and grief— born with the same faculties— with the 
same destination, and the same hopes of Immortal life. And as we give 
ourselves up to that idea, we would fain, if we could, alleviate his suffer- 
ings, and shed a ray of light on the darkness of his parting moments. 
This is a feeling which will come home to the heart of every one— even to 
the young and the thoughtless, and to those little used to the sight of woe. 
Why, then, we would ask, do we look with a careless indifference on tiiose 
who enter life ? why do we feel so little interest in the condition of those 
who enter upon that varied scene, of which we might contribute to en-* 
hance the enjoyments, and to diminish the sum of suffering, of discon- 
tent, and wretchedness ? And that education might do this, is the con- 
viction of all those who are competent to speak from experience. That 
it ought to do as much, is the persuasion, and that it may accomplish it, 
is the constant endeavor, of those who are truly interested in the welfare 
of mankind." 

[Pestalozzi's method of teaching is shown directly in C. Keiner's 
" Lessons on Number, as given in a Postal ozzian school, Cheam, Surrey. 
The Master's Manual, 12mo, pp. 224. London 1857"; and "Lessons on 
Form; or an introduction to Geometry. As given in a Pestalozzian 
school, Cheam, Surrey. 12mo, pp. 215. London 1837." The " Lessons on 
Objects " in the same series is well known in America as " Sheldon's Ob- 
ject Lessons," having been edited and published by E. A. Sheldon, Ph. D., 
principal of the State Normal School at Oswego, N. Y. 

His system of teaching arithmetic has also been recently reproduced 
and adapted to modern schools under the name of " Hoose's Pestalozzian 
Series of Arithmetics," by J. H. Hoose, Ph. D., principal of the State 
Normal School, at Cortland, N. Y, Dr. Hoose is a strenuous advocate of 
this method as superior to the " Gr\ib& Method," now so popular.] 



IX. 
JACOTOT. 

Of the inventors of peculiar methods at present 
known to me, by far the most important, in my judg- 
ment, is Jacotot; and if I were not well aware how 
small an interest English teachers take in Didactics, I 
should be much surprised that in this country his writ- 
ings and achievements have received so little attention. 
It is satisfactory to find, however, that last year some 
papers on the subject were read at the College of Pre- 
ceptors by Mr. Joseph Payne, one of the Yice-p resi- 
dents, and were afterward published in the ** Educational 
Times." * These papers, which will not, I hope, be suf- 
fered to lie buried in the pages of a periodical, contain 
the only good account of Jacotot I have met with, 
though having long been impressed with the importance 
of his ideas, I have at different times consulted various 
foreign books about him. 

In the following summary of Jacotot's system, I am 
largely indebted to Mr. Payne, and to him I refer the 
reader for a much more luminous account than my 
shorter space and inferior knowledge of the subject 
enable me to offer. 

Jacotot was born at Dijon, of humble parentage, in 
1110. Even as a boy he showed his preference for 

* For June, July, and September, 1867. [Now found in his " Lectures 
on the Science and Art of Education," Complete edition, pp. 339-385.] 



BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. 197 

" self -teaching." We are told that he rejoiced greatly in 
the acquisition of all kinds of knowledge that could be 
gained by his own efforts, while he steadily resisted 
what was imposed on him by authority. He, however, 
was early distinguished by his acquirements, and at the 
age of twenty-five was appointed sub-director of the 
Polytechnic school. Some years afterward he became 
Professor of " the Method of Sciences at Dijon," and 
it was here that his method of instruction first attracted 
attention. ** Instead of pouring forth a flood of infor- 
mation on the subject under attention from his own 
ample stores — explaining everything, and thus too fre- 
quently superseding in a great degree the pupil's own 
investigation of it — Jacotot, after a simple statement of 
the subject, with its leading divisions, boldly started it 
as a quarry for the class to hunt down, and invited every 
member to take part in the chase." * All were free to 
ask questions, to raise objections, to suggest answers. 
The Professor himself did little more than by leading 
questions put them on the right scent. He was after, 
ward Professor of Ancient and Oriental languages, of 
Mathematics, and of Roman Law; and he pursued the 
same method, we are told, with uniform success. Being 
compelled to leave France as an enemy of the Bourbons, 
he was appointed, in 1818, when he was forty-eight 
years old, to the Professorship of the French Language 
and Literature at the University of Louvaiii. The cele- 
brated teacher was received with enthusiasm, but he 
soon met with an unexpected difficulty. Many mera- 

* There is a singular coincidence even in metaphor between Mr. 
Payne's account of Jacotot's mode of instructing this class and Mr. Wil- 
son's directions for teaching science. {Essays on a Liberal Education.) 
[Mr. Payne thought highly of this paper by Mr. Wilson, and quotes from 
it on pages 140, 220 of the Reading-Club edition.] 



198 JOSEPH JACOTOT. 

bers of his large class knew no language but the Flemish 
and Dutch, and of these he himself was totally ignor- 
ant. He was, therefore, forced to consider how to 
teach without talking to his pupils. The plan he 
adopted was as follows: — He gave the young Flemings 
copies of Fenelon's " TeVemaque^^ with the French on one 
side, and a Dutch translation on the other. This they 
had to study for themselves, comparing the two lan- 
guages, and learning the French by heart. They were 
to go over the same ground again and again, and as soon 
as possible they were to give in French, however bad^ 
the substance of those parts which they had not yet com- 
mitted to memory. This method was found to succeed 
marvelously. Jacotot attributed its success to the fact 
that the students had learnt entirely hy the efforts of their 
own minds, and that, though working under his superin- 
tendence, they had been, in fact, their own teachers* 
Hence he proceeded to generalize, and by degrees 
arrived at a series of astounding paradoxes. These par- 
adoxes at first did their work well, and made noise 
enough in the world, but Jacotot seems to me like a 
captain, who, in his eagerness to astonish his opponents^ 
takes on board such heavy guns as eventually must sink 
his own ship. 

''^All human heings are equally capable of learning^'''' said 
Jacotot. Others had said this before; but no teacher, I 
suppose, of more than a fortnight's experience, had ever 
believed it. The truth which Jacotot chose to throw 
into this more than doubtful form, may perhaps be ex- 
pressed by saying that the student's power of learning 
depends, in a great measure, on his will, and that where 
there is no will there is no capacity. 



HIS PAEADOXES. 199 

" Every one can teach; and, moreover, can teach that which 
he does not know himself.'''' I believe this paradox is the 
property of Jacotot alone. It seems, on the face of it, 
so utterly absurd, that it seldom answers the purpose of 
a paradox — seldom draws attention to the truth of 
which it is a partial, or a perverted, or an exaggerated 
statement. The answer which Jacotot and his friends 
made to the scoffs of the unbelieving, was an appeal to 
facts. Jacotot, they said, not only taught French 
without any means of communicating with his pupils, 
but he also taught drawing and music, although quite 
ignorant on those subjects. Without the least wishing 
to discredit the honesty of the witnesses who make this 
assertion, I can only admit the fact with great qualifica- 
tions. Let us ask ourselves, what is the meaning of the 
assertion that we can teach what we do not know. 
First of all, we have to get rid of some ambiguity in the 
meaning of the word teach. To teach, according to 
Jacotot's idea, is to cause to learn. Teaching and leani- 
ing are therefore correlatives: where there is no learning 
there can be no teaching. But this meaning of the 
word only coincides partially with the ordinary mean- 
ing. We speak of the lecturer or preacher as teaching 
when he gives his hearers an opportunity of learning, 
and do not say that his teaching ceases the instant they 
cease to attend. On the other hand, we do not call a 
parent a teacher because he sends his boy to school, and 
•o causes him to learn. The notion of teaching, then, in 
the minds of most of us, includes giving information, or 
showing how an art is to be performed; and we look 
upon Jacotot's assertion as absurd, because we feel that 
no one can give information which he does not possess, 



200 JOSEPH JACOTOT. 

or show how anything is to be done if he does not him- 
self know. But let us take the Jacototian definition of • 
teaching — causing to learn— and then see how far a per- 
son can cause another to learn that of which he himself 
is ignorant. 

- Subjects which are taught may be divided into three 
great classes: — 1, Facts; 2, reasonings, or generalization 
from facts, i. e., science; 3, actions which have to be 
performed by the learner, i. e., arts. 

1. We learn some facts by what the Pestalozzians 
call intuition, i. e., by direct experience. It may be as 
well to make the number of them as large as possible. 
No doubt there are no facts which are known so perfectly 
as these. For instance, a boy w^ho has tried to smoke, 
knows the fact that tobacco is apt to produce nausea, 
much better than another who has picked up the infor- 
mation at second-hand. An intelligent master may sug. 
gest experiments, even in matters about which he him- 
self is ignorant, and thus, in Jacotot's sense, he teaches 
things which he does not know. But some facts can 
not be learnt in this way, and then a Newton is helpless 
either to find them out for himself, or to teach them to 
others without knowing them. If the teacher does not 
know in what county Tavistock is, he can only learn 
from those who do, and the pupils will be no cleverer 
than their master. Here, then, I consider that Jacotot's 
pretensions utterly break down. " No," the answer is; 
*' the teacher may give the pupil an atlas, and direct the 
hoy to find out for himself; thus the master will teach 
what he does not know." But, in this case, he is a 
teacher only so far as he knows. For what he does not 
know, he hands over the pupil to the maker of the map, 



IGNORANCE CANNOT TEACH. 201 

who communicates with him, not orally, but by ink and 
paper. The master's ignorance is simply an obstacle to 
the boy's learning; for the boy would leara sooner the 
position of Tavistock, if it were shown him on the map. 
" That's the very point," says the disciple of Jacotot. 
*'If the boy gets the knowledge without any trouble, he 
is likely to forget it again directly. 'Lightly come, 
lightly go.' Moreover, his faculiy of observation will 
not have been exercised." It may, indeed, be well not to 
allow the knowledge even of facts, to come too easily; 
though I doubt whether the difficalties which arise from 
the master's ignorance will generally be the most advan- 
tageous. Still there is obviously a limit. If we gave 
boys their lessons in cipher, and offered a prize to the 
first decipherer, one would probably be found at last, 
and meantime all the boys' powers of observation, etc., 
would have been cultivated by comparing like signs in 
different positions, and guessing at their meaning: but 
the boys' time might have been better employed. Many 
eminent authorities consider that the memory is assisted 
by dictionary work, but all are agreed that, at least in 
the case of beginners, the outlay of time is too great for 
the advantage obtained. Jacotot's plan of teaching a 
language which the master did not know, was to put a 
book, with, say, " Arma virumque cano.J'' etc., on one side, 
and " I sing arms and the man," etc. , on the other, and 
to require the pupil to puzzle over it till he found out 
which word answered to which. I contend that in this 
case the teacher was the translator; and though from 
the roundabout way in which the knowledge wa.s com- 
municated the pupil derived some benefit, the benefit 



202 JOSEPH JACOTOT. 

was hardly sufficient to make up for the expenditure of 
time involved." 

I hold, then, that Jacotot did not teach facts of which 
he was ignorant, except in the sense in which the parent 
who sends his boy to school may be said to teach him. 
All Jacotot did was to direct the pupil to learn, some- 
times in a very awkward fashion, from somebody else.* 

When we come to science, we find all the best 
authorities agree that the pupil should be led to princi- 
ples, if possible, and not have the j^i'inciples brought to 
him. Mr. Wilson of Rugby, Professor Tyndall, Mr. H. 
Spencer, have all spoken eloquently on this subject, and 
shown how valuable scientific teaching is, when thus 
conducted, in drawing out the faculties of the mind. 
But although a schoolboy may be led to great scientific 
discoveries by any one who knows the road, he will have 
no more chance of making them with an ignorant 
teacher, than he would have had in the days of the 
Ptolemies. Here again, then, I can not understand how 
the teacher can teach what he does not know. He may, 
indeed, join his pupil in investigating principles, but he 
must either keep with the pupil or go in advance of him. 
In the first case he is only a fellow-pupil; in the second, 
he teaches only that which he knows. 

Finally, we come to arts, and we are told that Jaco- 
tot taught drawing and music, without being either a 
draughtsman or a musician. In art everything depends 
on rightly directed practice. The most consummate artist 

♦ Here Jacotot's notion of teaching reminds one of the sophism quoted 
by Montaigce— "A Westphalia ham makes a man drink. Drink quenche* 
thirst. Therefore a Westphalia ham quenches tliirst." 



TEACHING OF ART. 203* 

can not communicate his skill, and is often inferior as a 
teacher to one whose attention is more concentrated on 
the mechanism of the art. Perhaps it is not even neces- 
sary that the teacher should be able to do the exercises 
himself, if only be knows how they should be done; but 
he seldom gets credit for this knowledge, unless he can 
show that he knows how the thing should be done, by 
doing it. Lessing tells us that Raphael would have been 
a great painter even if he had been born without hands.- 
He would not, however, have succeeded in getting man- 
kind to believe it. I grant then that the teacher of art 
need not be a first-rate artist, and in some very excep- 
tional cases, need not be an artist at all; but, if he can 
not perform the exercises he gives his pupil, he must at 
least know how they should he done. But Jacotot claims 
perfect ignorance. We are told that he "taught" draw- 
ing by setting objects before his pupils, and making 
them imitate them on paper as best they could. Of 
course the art originated in this way, and a j^erson with 
great perseverance, and (I must say, in spite of Jacotot) 
with more than average ability, would make considera- 
ble progress with no proper instruction; but he would 
lose much by the ignorance of the person calling himself 
his teacher. An awkward habit of holding the pencil 
will make skill doubly difficult to acquire, and thus half 
his time might be wasted. Then, again, he would hardly 
have a better eye than the Cimabues and Bellinis of 
early art, so the drawing of his landscape would not be 
less faulty than theirs. To consider music. I am told 
that a person who is ignorant of music can teach, say, the 
piano or the violin. This assertion, I confess, seems to 
me to go beyond the region of paradox into that of 



-204 JOSEPH JACOTOT. 

Utter nonsense. In music, talent often surmounts all 
kinds of difficulties; but it would have taxed the genius 
of Mozart himself to become a good player on the violin 
and piano, without being shown how to stop and finger.* 

I have thus carefully examined Jacotot's pretensions 
to teach what he did not know, because I am anxious 
that what seems to me the rubbish should be cleared 
away from his principles, and should no longer conceal 
those parts of his system which are worthy of general 
attention. 

At the root of Jacotot's Paradox lay a truth of very 
great importance. The highest and best teaching is not 
that which makes the pupils passive recipients of other 
people's ideas (not to speak of the teaching which con- 
veys mere words without any ideas at all), but that 
which guides and encourages the pupils in working for 
themselves and thinking for themselves. The master, 
as Mr. Payne well says, can no more think, or practice, 
or see for his pupil, than he can digest for him, or walk 
for him. The pupil must owe everything to his own 
exertions, which it is the function of the master to en- 
courage and direct. Perhaps this may seem very obvi- 
ous truth, but obvious or not it has been very generally 
neglected. The Jesuits, who were the best masters of 
the old school, did little beyond communicating facts, 
and insisting on their pupils committing these facts to 



* This assertion is probably too strong. Mozart would have learnt to 
play (and he could only have played well) on the violin and piano, if he 
had been shut up by himself with those instruments. But he would not 
have learnt so rapidly or so well as if he had been shown how to set to 
work. His fingering would always have been clumsy: he would have been 
hampered by a bad mechanism in his violin-playing, and he would have 
had a wretched "bow-arm." 



THE UNDERLYING TRUTH. 205 

memory. Their system of lecturing has indeed now 
passed away, and boys are left to acquire facts from 
school-books instead of from the master. But this 
change is merely accidental. The essence of the teach- 
ing still remains. Even where the master does not con- 
fine himself to hearing what the scholars have learnt by 
heart, he seldom does more than offer explanations. He 
measures the teaching rather by the amount which has 
been put before the scholars — by what he has done for 
them and shown them — than by what they have learned* 
But this is not teaching of the highest type. When the 
votary of Dullness in the " Dunciad " is rendering an 
account of his services, he arrives at this climax: 

For thee explain a thing till all men doubt it, 
And write about it, Goddess, and about it. 

And in the same spirit Mr. Wilson stigmatizes as syn- 
onymous ** the most stupid and most didactic teaching." 
All the eminent authorities on education have a very 
different theory of the teacher's functions. "Educa- 
tion," says Pestalozzi, " instead of merely considering 
what is to be imparted to children, ought to consider 
first what they already possess; not merely their developed 
faculties, but also their innate faculties capable of 
development." The master's attention, then, is not to 
be fixed on his own mind and his own store of knowl- 
edge, but on his pupil's mind and on its gradual expan- 
sion. He must, in fact, be not so much a teacher as a 
trainer. Here we have the view which Jacotot intended 
to enforce by his paradox; for we may possibly train 
faculties which we do not ourselves possess. Sayers' 
trainer brought up his man to face Heenan, but he could 
not have done so himself. The sportsman trains his 



206 JOSEPH JACOTOT. 

tpointer and his hunter to perform feats which are alto- 
•gether out of the range of his own capacities. Now, 
■*' training is the cultivation bestowed on any set of fac- 
ulties with the object of developing them " (Wilson), 
and to train any faculty, you must set it to work. 
Hence it follows, that as boys' minds are not simply 
.their memories, the master must aim at something 
more than causing his pupils to remember facts. Jaco- 
tot has done good service to education by giving prom- 
inence to this truth, and by showing in his method how 
other faculties may be cultivated besides the memory. 

^^ Tout est dans touf^ ("All is in all"), is another of 
Jacotot's paradoxes. I do not propose discussing it as 
the philosophical thesis which takes other forms, as 
** Every man is a microcosm," etc., but merely to inquire 
into its meaning as applied to didactics. 

If you asked an ordinary Frenchman who Jacotot was, 
he would probably answer, Jacotot was a man who 
thought you could learn everything by getting up Feu- 
elon's ^^Telemaque'^^ by heart. By carrying your investi- 
gation further, you would find that this account of him 
required modification, that the learning by heart was 
only part, and a very small part, of what Jacotot de- 
manded from his pupils, but you would also find that 
entire mastery of ^^ TeUmaque^^ was his first requisite, and 
that he managed to connect everything he taught with 
that " model-book." Of course, if " tout est dans tout^"* 
everything is in Telemaque; and, said an objector, "also 
in the first book of Telemaque,''^ and in the first word, 
jJacotot went through a variety of subtilities to show 
that all " Telemaque " is contained in the word Calypso, 
9,nd perhaps he would have been equally successful, if 



ONE THING THOROUGHLY LEARNED. 207 

he bad been required to take only tbe first letter instead 
of tbe first word. The reader is amused ratber tban 
<jonvinced by tbese discussions, but be finds tbem not 
witbout fruit. Tbey bring to his mind very forcibly a 
truth to which he bas hitherto probably not paid suffi- 
cient attention. He sees that all knowledge is connected 
together, or (what will do equally well for our present 
purpose) that there are a thousand links by which we 
may bring into connection the different subjects of 
knowledge. If by means of these links we can attach 
in our minds tbe knowledge we acquire to the knowledge 
we already possess, we shall learn faster and more in- 
telligently, and at the same time we shall have a much 
better chance of retaining our new acquisitions. Tbe 
memory, as we all know, is assisted even by artificial 
association of ideas, much more by natural. Hence the 
value of " tout est dans tout^' or, to adopt a modification 
suggested by Mr. Payne, of tbe connection of knowl- 
edge. Suppose we know only one subject, but know 
that thoroughly, our knowledge, if I may express myself 
algebraically, can not be represented by ignorance plus 
the knowledge of that subject. We have acquired a 
great deal more than that. When other subjects come 
before us, they may prove to be so connected with what 
we bad before, that we may almost seem to know them 
already. In other words, when we know a little thor- 
oughly, though our actual possession is small, we have 
potentially a great deal more. 

Jacotot's practical application of his ^Hout est dans touV* 
was as follows: '-'- If faut apprendre quelque chose, et y rap- 
porter tout le reste.''"' ("Tbe pupil must learn something 
thoroughly, and refer everything ;to that.") For Ian- 



208 JOSEPH JACOTOT. 

guage he must take a model-book, and become thoroughly 
master of it. His knowledge must not be a verbal 
knowledge only, but he must enter into the sense and 
spirit of the writer. Here we find that Jacotot's practi- 
cal advice coincides with that of many other great 
authorities, who do not base it on the same principle. 
The Jesuits' maxim was, that their pupils should always 
learn something thoroughly, however little it might be. 
Pestalozzi, as I have mentioned, insisted on the children 
going over the elements again and again till they 
were completely master of them. "Not only," says 
he, "have the first elements of knowledge in every sub- 
ject the most important bearing on its complete outline; 
but the child's confidence and interest are gained by 
perfect attainment even in the lowest stage of instruction." 
Ascham, Ratich, and Comenius all required a model-book 
to be read and re-read till words and thoughts were 
firmly fixed in the pupil's memory. Jacotot probably 
never read Ascham's " Schoolmaster." If he had done 
so, he might have appropriated some of Ascham's words 
as exactly conveying his own thoughts. Ascham, as we 
saw, recommended that a short book should be thoroughly 
mastered, each lesson being worked over in different 
ways a dozen times at the least. "Thus is learned eas- 
ily, sensibly, by little and little, not only all the hard 
congruities of grammar, the choice of aptest words, the 
right framing of words and sentences, comeliness of fig- 
ures, and forms fit for every matter and proper for every 
tongue; but that which is greater also — in marking daily 
and following diligently thus the best authors, like in- 
vention of arguments, like order in disposition, like 
utterance in elocution, is easily gathered up; whereby 



MEMORIZING. 209 

your scholar shall be brought not only to like eloquence, 
but also to all true understanding and right judgment, 
both for writing and speaking." The voice seems Jaco- 
tot's voice, though the hand is the hand of Ascham. 

But if Jacotot agrees so far with earlier authorities, 
there is one point in which he seems to differ from them. 
He makes great demands on the memory, and requires 
six books of " Telemaque^' to be learned by heart. On 
the other hand, Montaigne said, " Savoir par cceur est ne 
pas savoir " [To know by heart is not to know at all] ; 
which is echoed by Rousseau, H. Spencer, etc. Ratich 
required that nothing should be learnt by heart. Pro- 
tests against " loading the memory," " saying without 
book," etc., are everywhere to be met with, and no- 
where more vigorously expressed than in Ascham. He 
says of the grammar-school boys of his time, that 
"their whole knowledge, by learning without the book, 
was tied only to their tongue and lips, and never as- 
cended up to the brain and head, and therefore was soon 
spit out of the mouth again. They learnt without book 
everything, they ur.derstood within the book little or 
nothing." But these protests were really directed at 
verbal knowledge, when it is made to take the place of 
knowledge of the thing signified. We are always too 
ready to suppose that words are connected with ideas, 
though both old and young are constantly exposing 
themselves to the sarcasm of Mephistopheles: — 

, . *. eben wo Begriflfe fehlen, 

Da stallt ein Wort zur rechten Zeit sich ein.* 

* . . . just where meaning fails, a word 
Comes patly in to serve your turn. 

Theodore Martin's Trans. 
M 



210 JOSEPH JACOTOT. 

Against this danger Jacotot took special precautions. 
The pupil was to undergo an examination in everything 
connected with the lesson learnt, and the master's share 
in the work was to convince himself, from the answers 
he received, that the pupil thoroughly grasped the mean- 
ing, as well as remembered the words, of the author. 
Still the six books of " Telemaque^''^ which Jacotot gave 
to be learnt by heart, was a very large dose, and Mr. 
Payne is of opinion that he would have been more faith- 
ful to his own principles if he had given the first book 
only. 

There are three ways in which the model-book may 
be studied. 1st. It may be read through rapidly again 
and again, which was Ratich's plan and Hamilton's; or, 
2d, each lesson may be thoroughly mastered, read in 
various ways a dozen times at the least, which was As- 
cham's plan; or, 3d, the pupil may begin always at the 
beginning, and advance a little further each time, which 
was Jacotot's plan. This last could not, of course, be 
carried very far. The repetitions, when the pupil had 
got on some way in the book, could not always be from 
the beginning; still every part was to be repeated so 
frequently that nothing could he forgotten. Jacotot did not 
wish his pupils to learn simply in order to forget, but to 
learn in order to remember forever. " We are learned," 
said he, " not so far as we have learned, but only so far 
as we remember." He seems, indeed, almost to ignore 
the fact that the act of learning serves other purposes 
than that of making learned, and to assert that to forget 
is the same as never to have learned, which is a palpable 
error. We necessarily forget much that passes through 
our minds, and yet its effect remains. All grown people 



KNOWLEDGE VS. POWER. 211 

have arrived at some opinions, convictions, knowledge, 
but they can not call to mind every spot they trod on in 
the road thither. When we have read a great history, 
say, or traveled through a fresh country, we have gained 
more than the number of facts we happen to remember. 
The mind seems to have formed an acquaintance with 
that history or that country, which is something differ- 
ent from the mere acquisition of facts. Moreover, our 
interests, as well as our ideas, may long survive the 
memory of the facts which originally started them. 
We are told that one of the old judges, when a barrister 
objected to some dictum of his, put him down by the 
assertion, "Sir, I have forgotten more law than ever 
you read." If he wished to make the amount forgotten 
a measure of the amount remembered, this was certainly 
fallacious, as the ratio between the two is not a constant 
quantity. But he may have meant that this extensive 
reading had left its result, and that he could see things 
from more points of view than the less traveled legal 
vision of his opponent. Thsit power acquired by learning 
may also last longer than the knowledge of the thing 
learned is sufficiently obvious. 

The advantages derived from having learnt a thing 
are, then, not entirely lost when the thing itself is for- 
gotten. This leads me to speak, though at the risk of a 
digression, on the present state of opinion on this mat- 
ter. In setting about the study of any subject, we may 
desire (1) the knowledge of that subject; or (2) the 
mental vigor derivable from learning it; or (3) we may 
hope to combine these advantages. Now, in spite of 
the aphorism which connects knowledge and power 
together, we f^nd that these have become the badges of 



212 JOSEPH JACOTOT. 

opposite parties. One party would make knowledge 
the end of education. Mr. Spencer assumes as a law^ of 
nature that the study which conveys useful knowledge 
must also give mental vigor; so he considers that the 
object of education should be to impart useful knowl- 
edge, and teach us in what way to treat the body, to 
treat the mind, to manage our affairs, to bring up a 
family, to behave as a citizen, etc., etc. The old school, 
on the other hand, which I may call the English party, 
as it derives its strength from some of the peculiar 
merits and demerits of the English character, heartily 
despises knowledge, and would make the end of educa- 
tion power only. 

As the most remarkable outcome of this idea of edu- 
cation, we have the Cambridge mathematical tripos. 

The typical Cambridge Tman studies mathematics, not 
because he likes mathematics, or derives any pleasure 
from the perception of mathematical truth, still less 
with the notion of ever using his knowledge; but either 
because, if he is *' a good man," he hopes for a fellow- 
ship, or because, if he can not aspire so high, he consid- 
ers reading the thing to do, and finds a satisfaction in 
mental effort just as he does in a constitutional to the 
Gogmagogs. When such a student takes his degree, he 
is by no means a highly cultivated man; but he is not 
the sort of a man we can despise for all that. He bas- 
in him, to use one of his own metaj^hors, a considerable 
amount oi force, which may be applied in any direction. 
He has great power of concentration and sustained men- 
tal effort even on subjects which are distasteful to him. 
In other words, his mind is under the control of his will, 
and he can bring it to bear promptly and vigorously on 



THE CAMBRIDGE TRIPOS. 213 

anything put before him. He will sometimes be half 
through a piece of work, while an average Oxonian (as 
we Cambridge men conceive of him at least) is thinking 
about beginning. But his training has taught him to 
value mental force without teaching him to care about 
its application. Perhaps he has been working at the 
gymnasium, and has at length succeeded in "putting 
up " a hundredweight. In learning to do this, he has 
been acquiring strength for its own sake. He does not 
want to put up hundredweights, but simply to be able 
to put them up, and his reward is the consciousness of 
power. Now the tripos is a kind of competitive exami- 
nation in putting up weights. The student who has 
been training for it has acquired considerable mental 
vigor, and when he has put up his weight he falls back 
on the consciousness of strength which he seldom thinks 
of using. Having put up the heavier, he despises the 
lighter weights. He rather prides himself on his ignor- 
ance of such things as history, modern languages, and 
English Hterature. He "can get those up in a few eve- 
nings," whenever he wants them. He reminds me, 
indeed, of a tradesman who has worked hard to have a 
large balance at his banker's. This done, he is satisfied. 
He has neither taste nor desire for the things which 
make wealth valuable; but w^hen he sees other people in 
the enjoyment of them, he hugs himself with the con- 
sciousness that he can write a check for such things 
whenever he pleases. 

I confess that this outcome of the English theory of 
education does not seem to me altogether satisfactory. 
But we have, as yet, no means of judging what will be 
the outcome of the other theory which makes knowl- 



214 JOSEPH JACOTOT. 

edge the end of education. Its champions confine 
themselves at present to advising that a variety of sci- 
ences be taught to boys, and maintain a rather perplex- 
ing silence as to how to teach them. Mr. Spencer, as 
we have seen, requires that a boy should be taught how 
to behave in every relation of manhood, and he also 
tells us how to teach — elementary geometry. Still these 
advocates of knowledge are acquiring a considerable 
amount of influence, and there seems reason to fear lest 
halting between the two theories, our education, instead of 
combining knowledge and power, should attain to neither. 
Our old-fashioned school-teaching, confined as it was 
to a grammatical drill in the classical languages, did 
certainly give something of the power which comei* 
from concentrated effort. The Eton Latin Grammar 
does not indeed seem to me a well-selected model-book, 
but many a man has found the value of knowing even 
that book thoroughly. Now, ho \\ ever, a cry has been 
raised for useful information. It is shameful, we are 
told, that a boy leaving school should not know the 
names of the capitals of Europe, and should never have 
heard of the Habeas Corpus and the Bill of Rights, etc.^ 
etc. The schoolmaster is beginning to give way. He 
admits homoeopathic doses of geographical, historical,, 
and scientific epitomes and of modern languages: and 
perhaps between these stools the unlucky schoolboy will 
come to the ground; his accurate knowledge of Latin 
grammar will be exchanged for ** some notion " of a 
variety of things, and in the end his condition will be 
best described by varying a famous sarcasm, and saying,, 
that if he knew a little of good hard work, he would 
know a little of everything. 



KNOWLEDGE AND POWER. 215 

The reader will by this time begin to suspect that I 
am an educational Tory after all, even a reactionary 
Tory. This I deny, but I am probably not free from 
those prejudices which beset Englishmen, especially 
Cambridge men and schoolmasters, and I confess I look 
with dismay on the effort which is being made to intro- 
duce a large number of subjects into our school-course, 
and set up knowledge rather than power as the goal of 
education.* 

But can not these be combined ? May we not teach 
such subjects as shall give useful knowledge and power 
too ? On this point the philosopher and the schoolmas- 
ter are at issue. The philosopher says, It is desirable 
that we should have the knowledge of such and such 
sciences — therefore teach them. The schoolmaster says, 
It may be desirable to know those sciences, but boys 
can not learn them. The knowledge acquired by boys 
will never be very valuable in itself. We must, there- 
fore, consider it a means rather than an end. We must 
think first of mental discipline; for this boys must thor- 
oughly master what they learn, and this thoroughness 
absolutely requires that the young mind should be ap- 
plied to very few subjects; and, though we are quite 
ready to discuss which subjects afford the best mental 
training, we can not allow classics to be thrust out till 



*In this matter the testimony of Lord Stanley is very vahiable. '• If 
teaching is, as I believe, better on the whole in the higher than in the 
lower classes (of society) it is chiefly on tliis account— not that more is 
taught at an early age, but less; that time is taken, that the wall is not 
run up in haste; that the bricks are set on carefully, and the mortar 
allowed time to dry. And so the structure, whether high or low, is likely 
to stand." (From a speech reported in the Evening Mail, December 9, 
1864.) 



216 JOSEPH JACOTOT. 

some other subjects have been proved worthy to reign 
in their stead. 

Unless I am mistaken, the true ground of complaint 
against the established education is, that it fails to give, 
not knowledge, but the desire of knowledge. A literary 
education which leaves no love of reading behind, can 
not be considered entirely successful. 

As I have said elsewhere, I would admit a natural 
science into the curriculum in order to give the mind 
some training in scientific processes, and some interest 
in scientific truth. I would also endeavor to cultivate a 
fondness for English literature* and the fine arts; but, 
whatever the subject taught, I consider that, for educa- 
tional purposes, the power and the desire to acquire 
knowledge, are to be valued far before knowledge 
itself. 

How does this conclusion bear upon the matter I set 
out with, the function of memory in education ? 

Classicists, scientific men, and all others, are agreed 
about the value of memory, and must therefore desire 
that its powers should not be squandered on the learning 
of facts which, for want of repetition, will be soon lost, 
or facts which will prove of little value if retained. But 
in estimating facts, we must think rather of their educa- 
tional value than of their bearing upon after-life. We 
must make the memory a storehouse of such facts as are 
good material for the other powers of the mind to work 
with; and, that the facts may serve this purpose, they 
must be such as the mind can thoroughly grasp andhan- 

* The claims of English literature in education have been urged by 
Professor Seeley with a force which seems to me irresistible. (See Mac- 
miUan's Magazine for November, 1867.) 



MEMORY IN EDUCATION. 217 

die, and such as may be connected together. " To in- 
struct," as Mr. Payne reminds us, is instruere, " to put 
together in order, to build or construct." We must be 
careful, then, not to cram the mind with isolated, or as 
Mr. Spencer calls them, unorganizalle facts — such facts, 
e. g., as are taught to young ladies.* 

A great deal of our children's memory is wasted in 
storing facts of this kind, which can never form part 
of any organism. We do not teach them geography 
{earth knowledge, as the Germans call it), but the names of 
places. Our " history " is a similar, though disconnected 
study. We leave our children ignorant of the land, 
but insist on their getting up the "landmarks." And, 
perhaps, from a latent perception of the uselessness of 
such work, neither teachers nor scholars ever think of 
these things as learnt to be remembered. Latin gram- 
mar is gone through again and again, and a boy feels 
that the sooner he gets it into his head, the better it will 
be for him; but who expects that the lists of geographi- 

* I do not pretend myself to have fathomed the mystery of what i« 
taught to youn? ladies, but I follow the best authorites on the subject. 
*' 'I can not remember the time,' said Maria Bertram, ' when I did not 
know a great deal that Fanny has not the least notion of yet. How long 
ago is it, aunt, since we used to repeat the chronological order of the kings 
of England, with the dates of their accessions, and most of the principal 
events of their reigns ? ' ' Yes,' added Julia, 'and of the Roman emperors 
as low as Severus, besides a great deal of the heathen mythology, and all the 
metals, semi-metals, planets, and distinguished philosophers.' Very true, 
indeed, my dears,' replied the aunt, ' but you are blessed with wonderful 
memories. . . . Remember that if you are ever so forward and clever 
yourselves, you should always be modest; for, as much as you know 
already, there is a great deal more for you to learn.' 'Yes, I know there is,' 
said Julia, ' till I am seventeen.'" (Miss Austen's MansHeld Park.) And, 
fortunately for the human race, the knowledge vanishes away as soon as 
that grand climacteric is passed, though perhaps we must regret that of tea 
nothing but sheer vacuity is left in its place. 



218 JOSEPH JACOTOT. 

cal and historical names which are learnt one half-year 
will be remembered the next ? I have seen it asserted, 
that when a boy leaves school he has already forgotten 
nine-tenths of what he has been taught, and I dare say 
that estimate is quite within the mark. 

By adopting the principles of Jacotot, we shall avoid 
a great deal of this waste. We shall give some thor- 
ough knowledge with which fresh knowledge may be 
connected. 

Perfect familiarity with a subject is something beyond 
the mere understanding it, and being able with diflSculty 
to reproduce what we have learned. A Cambridge man 
getting up book-work for the tripos, does not indeed at- 
tempt to learn it by heart, without understanding itj 
but when his mind has thoroughly mastered the steps of 
the reasoning, he goes over it again and again, till he 
uses, in fact, hardly any faculty but his memory in 
writing it out. If he has to think during the operation, 
lie considers that piece of book-work not properly got 
up.* By thus going over the same thing again and 



* As an instance of the use of memory in mathematics, and also of the 
power acquired by perfect attainment, I may mention a case which came 
under my own observation. A '• three days " man, not by any means re- 
markable for mathematical ability, had got up the book-work of his sub- 
ject very exactly, but had nevt^r done a problem. In the three days* 
problem paper, to his no small surprise, he got out several of them. A 
friend wlio was afterward a good wrangler, ventured to doubt his having 
done a particular problem. •' It came out very easily," said the three 
days' man. " from such and such a formula." "You are right," said the 
wrangler, "I worked it out in a much clumsier way myself, I never 
thought of that formula." I may mention here a fact which, whether it is 
Apropos [to the purpose] or not, will be interesting to musicians. The 
late Professor Walmisley, of Cambridge, told me that when his godfather 
Attwood was Mozart's pupil, Mozart always had Bach's Forty-eight Pre- 
ludes and Fugues on his piano, and hardly played anything else. 



"learn, repeat, reflect, verify." 219 

again, we acquire a thorough command over our knowl- 
edge, and the feeling perfectly at home, even within 
narrow borders, gives a consciousness of strength. An 
old adage tells us that the Jack-of-all-trades is master of 
none; but the master of one trade will have no difficulty 
in extending his insight and capacity beyond it. To use 
an illustration, which is of course an illustration merely, 
I would kindle knowledge in children, like fire in a 
grate. A stupid servant, with a small quantity of wood, 
spreads it over the whole grate. It blazes away, goes 
out, and is simply wasted. Another, who is wiser or 
more experienced, kindles the whole of the wood at one 
spot, and the fire, thus concentrated, extends in all di- 
rections. Thus would I concentrate the beginning of 
knowledge; and although I could not expect to make 
much show for a time, I should trust that afterward the 
fire would extend, almost of its own accord. 

I proceed to give Jacotot's directions for carrying out 
the rule, " llfaut apprendre quelque chose, et y rapporter tout 
le reste.^^ 

1. Learn — i. e., learn so as to know thoroughly, per« 
fectly, immovably (imperturbablement), as well six months 
or twelve moths hence, as now — something — something 
which fairly represents the subject to be acquired, which 
contains its essential characteristics. 2. Repeat that 
"something" incessantly {sans cesse), i. e., every day, or 
very frequently, from the beginning without any omis- 
sion, so that no part may be forgotten. 3. Reflect 
upon the matter thus acquired, so as by degrees to make 
it a possession of the mind as well as of the memory, so 
that, being appreciated as a whole, and appreciated in its^ 
minutest parte, what is as yet unknown, may be referred 



^220 JOSEPH JACOTOT. 

4o it and interpreted by it. 4. Verify, or test, general 
remarks, e. g., grammatical rules, etc., made by others, 
by comparing them with the facts (i. e., the words and 
phraseology) which you have learnt yourself.* 

In conclusion, I will give some account of the way in 
which reading, writing, and the mother-tongue were 
taught on the Jacototian system. 

The teacher takes a book, say Edgeworth's *' Early 
Lessons," points to the first word, and names it, "Frank." 
The child looks at the word and also pronounces it. 
Then the teacher does the same with the first two 
-words, " Frank and; " then with the three first, " Frank 
and Robert," etc. When a line or so has been thus 
gone over, the teacher asks which word is Robert? 
"What word is that (pointing to one)? 'Find me the 
same word in this line' (pointing to another part of the 
book). When a sentence has been thus acquired, the 
words already known are analyzed into syllables, and 
these syllables the child must pick out elsewhere. 
Finally, the same thing is' done with letters. When the 
child can read a sentence, that sentence is put before 
-him written in small-hand, and the child is required to 
copy it. When he has copied the first word, he is led, 
•by the questions of the teacher, to see how it differs 
from the original, and then he tries again. The pupil 
must always correct himself, guided j^nly by questions. 
This sentence must be worked at till the pupil can write 
if pretty well from memory. He then tries it in larger 
'Characters. By carrying out this plan, the children's 
powers of observation and making comparisons are 

* I take this paragraph verbatim from Mr. Payne. 



MODE OF TEACHING. 221 

streDgtheDed, and the arts of reading and writing arfr 
said to be very readily acquired. 

For the mother-tongue, a model-book is chosen and 
thoroughly learned. Suppose " Rasselas " is selected. 
The pupil learns by heart a sentence, or a few sentences^ 
and to-morrow adds a few more, still repeating from the 
beginning. The teacher, after two or three lessons of 
learning and repeating, takes portions — any portion — of 
the matter, and submits it to the crucible of the pupil's 
mind: — Who was Rasselas? Who was his father? 
What is the father of waters? Where does it begin its 
course ? Where is Abyssinia ? Where is Egypt ? Where 
was Rasselas placed ? What sort of a person was Ras- 
selas ? What is ' credulity ' ? What are the ' whispers 
of fancy,' 'the promises of youth,' etc.? What was 
there peculiar in the position of Rasselas? Where was 
he confined ? Describe the valley. How would you 
have liked to live there? Why so ? Why not? etc." 

A great variety of written exercises is soon joined 
with the learning by heart. Pieces must be written from 
memory, -and the spelling, pointing, etc., corrected by 
the pupil himself from the book. The same piece must 
be written again and again, till there are no mistakes to 
correct. "This,"^says Mr. Payne, who has himself 
taught in this way, "is the best plan for spelling that 
has been devised." Then the pupil may write an analy- 
sis, may define words, distinguish between synonyms, 
explain metaphors, imitate descriptions, write imagin- 
ary dialogues or correspondence between the characters, 
etc. 

Besides these, a great variety of grammatical exer- 
cises may be given, and the force of prefixes and affixes 



222 JOSEPH JACOTOT. 

may be found out by the pupils themselves, by collection 
and comparison. "The resources even of such a book 
as 'Rasselas,'" says Mr. Payne, "will be found all but 
exhaustless, while the training which the mind under- 
goes in the process of thoroughly mastering it, the acts 
of analysis, comparison, induction, and deduction, per- 
formed so frequently as to become a sort of second 
nature, can not but serve as an excellent preparation for 
the subsequent study of English literature." 

We see, from these instances, how Jacotot sought to 
imitate the method by which young children and self- 
taught men teach themselves. All such proceed from 
objects to definitions, from facts to reflections and 
theories, from examples to rules, from particular obser- 
vations to general principles. They pursue, in fact, 
however unconsciously, the method of investigation^ the 
advantages of which are thus set out in a passage from 
Burke's treatise on the Sublime and Beautiful: — 

"I am convinced," says he, "that the method of 
teaching which approaches most nearly to the method 
of investigation is incomparably the best; since, not 
content with serving up a few barren and lifeless truths, 
it leads to the stock on which they grew; it tends to set 
the reader (or learner) himself in the track of invention, 
and to direct him into those paths in which the author 
has made his own discoveries." 

"For Jacotot, I think the claim may, without pre- 
sumption, be maintained, that he has, beyond all other 
teachers, succeeded in co-ordinating the method of ele- 
mentary teaching with the method of investigation" 
(Payne). 

The latter part of his life, which did not end till 



THE METHOD OF INVESTIGATION. 223 

1840, Jacotot spent in his native country — first at Va- 
lenciennes, and then at Paris. To the last he labored 
indefatigably, and with a noble disinterestedness, for 
what he believed to be the " intellectual emancipation " 
of his fellow-creatures. For a time, his system made 
great way in France, but the practices introduced by it 
were probably unworthy of its principles, and have 
been abandoned. The University of France, in 1852, 
recommended more attention to its principles:* but I 
have not observed any reference to Jacotot in Mr. Ar- 
nold's recent report. 

* "The professors have been directed to instruct their students in the 
secret movements of thought, not as heretofore by long expositions that 
can set at work only the mind of the professor, but, following the exam- 
ple that excellent teachers have revived from Socrates by questions that 
at every instant make the intelligence of the students share in the analy- 
sis, and, so to speak, in the discovery of the laws of reason." This is the 
quotation from the Report to the Emperor in 1853, on which M. Achilla 
Guillard seems to found the assertion in the text. The quotation, how- 
ever, recommends a return to Socrates, not Jacotot.— (iVoMve^e Biogra- 
phie, Oenerale. Jacotot.) 



X. 

HERBERT SPENCER. 

I ONCE heard it said by a teacher of great ability that 
no one without practical acquaintance with the subject 
could write anything worth reading on education. My 
own opinion differs very widely from this. I am not. 
indeed, prepared to agree with another authority, much 
given to paradox, that the actual work of education un- 
fits a man for forming enlightened views about it, but I 
think that the outsider, coming fresh to the subject, and 
unencumbered by tradition and prejudice, may hit upon 
truths which the teacher, whose attention is too much 
engrossed with practical difficulties, would fail to per- 
ceive without assistance, and that, consequently, the 
theories of intelligent men, unconnected with the work 
of education, deserve our careful, and, if possible, our 
impartial consideration. 

One of the most important works of this kind which 
has lately appeared, is the treatise of Mr. Herbert Spencer. 
So eminent a writer has every claim to be listened to 
with respect, and in this book he speaks with more than 
his individual authority. The views he has very vigor- 
ously propounded are shared by a^ number of distin- 
guished scientific men; and not a few of the unscientific 
believe that in them is shadowed forth the education of 
the future. 



KNOWLEDGE VS. POWER. 225 

It is perhaps to be regretted that Mr. Spencer has not 
kept the tone of one who investigates the truth in a sub- 
ject of great difficulty, but lays about him right and 
left, after the manner of a spirited controversialist. 
This, no doubt, makes his book much more entertaining 
reading than such treatises usually are, but, on the 
other hand, it has the disadvantage of arousing the an- 
tagonism of those whom he would most wish to influ- 
ence. When the man who has no practical acquaintance 
with educatiou, lays down the law ex cathed/ra [from the 
bench], garnished with sarcasm at all that is now going 
on, the schoolmaster, offended by the assumed tone of 
authority, sets himself to show where these theories 
would not work, instead of examining what basis of 
truth there is in them, and how far they should influ- 
ence his own practice. 

I shall proceed to examine Mr. Spencer's proposals 
with all the impartiality I am master of. 

The great question, whether the teaching which gives 
the most valuable knowledge is the same as that which 
best disciplines the faculties of the mind, Mr. Spencer 
dismisses briefly. ** It would be utterly contrary to the 
beautiful economy of nature," he says, " if one kind of 
culture were needed for the gaining of information, and 
another kind were needed as a mental gymnastic." But 
it seems to me that different subjects must be used to 
train the faculties at different stages of development. 
The processes of science, which form the staple of edu- 
cation in Mr. Spencer's system, can not be grasped by 
the intellect of a child. ''The scientific discover does 
the work, and when it is done the schoolboy is called in 
to witness the result, to learn its chief features by heart. 



226 HERBEET SPENCEE. 

and to repeat them when called upon, just as he is called 
on to name the mothers of the patriarchs, or to give an 
account of the Eastern campaigns of Alexander the 
Great." {Pall Mall Ga%ette, Feb. 8, 1867.) This, how- 
ever, affords but scanty training for the mind. We 
want to draw out the child's interests, and to direct 
them to worthy objects. We want not only to teach 
him, but to enable and encourage him to teach himself; 
and, if following Mr. Spencer's advice, we make him 
get up the species of plants, " which amount to some 
320,000," and the varied forms of animal life, which are 
"estimated at some 2,000,000," we may, as Mr. Spencer 
tells us, have strengthened his memory as effectually as 
by teaching him languages; but the pupil will, perhaps, 
have no great reason to rejoice over his escape from the 
horrors of the "As in Prsesenti," and "Propria quae Mari- 
bus." The consequences will be the same in both cases. 
We shall disgust the great majority of our scholars with 
the acquisition of knowledge, and with the use of the 
powers of their mind. Whether, therefore, we adopt 
or reject Mr. Spencer's conclusion, that there is one sort 
of knowledge which is universally the most valuable, I 
think I must deny that there is one sort of knowledge 
which is universally, and at every stage in education, the 
best adapted to develop the intellectual faculties. Mr. 
Spencer himself acknowledges this elsewhere. " There 
is," says he, " a certain sequence in which the faculties 
spontaneously develop, and a certain kind of knowledge, 
which each requires during its development. It is for 
us to ascertain this sequence, and supply this knowledge." 
Mr. Spencer discusses more fully " the relative value 
of knowledges," and this is a subject which has hitherto 



227 

not met with the attention it deserves. It is not suffi- 
cient for us to prove of any subject taught in our schools 
that the knowledge or the learning of it is valuable. We 
must also show that the knowledge or the learning of it 
is of at least as great value as that of anything else that 
might be taught in the same time. " Had we time to 
master all objects we need not be particular. To quote 
the old song — 

Could a man be secure 

That his life would endure, 

As of old for a thousand long years, 

What things he might know ! 

What deeds he might do ! 

And all without hurry or care ! 

But we that have but span-long lives must ever bear in 
mind our limited time for acquisition." 

To test the value of the learning imparted in educa- 
tion we must look to the end of education. This Mr. 
Spencer defines as follows: "To prepare us for complete 
living, is the function which education has to discharge, 
and the only rational mode of judging of an educational 
course is to judge in what degree it discharges such func- 
tion." For complete living we must know " in what 
way to treat the body; in what way to treat the mind; 
in what way to manage our affairs; in what way to bring 
lip a family; in what way to behave as a citizen; in what 
way to utilize those sources of happiness which nature 
supplies — how to use all our faculties to the greatest ad- 
vantage of ourselves and others." There are a number 
of sciences, 'says Mr. Spencer, which throw light on these 
subjects. It should, therefore, be the business of educa- 
tion to impart these sciences. 

But, if there were (which is far from being the case) 



228 HERBERT SPENCER. 

a well-defined and well-established science in each of 
these departments, those sciences would not be under- 
standable by children, nor would any individual have 
time to master the whole of them, or even '^ a due pro- 
portion of each." The utmost that could be attempted 
would be to give young people some knowledge of the 
results of such sciences and the rules derived from them. 
But to this Mr. Spencer would object that it would tend, 
like the learning of languages, " to increase the already 
undue respect for authority." 

To consider Mr. Spencer's divisions in detail, we come 
first to knowledge that leads to self-preservation: 

"Happily, that all-important part of education which 
goes to secure direct self-preservation, is, in part, already 
provided for. Too momentous to be left to our blun- 
dering, Nature takes it into her own hands." But Mr. 
Spencer warns us against such thwartings of Nature as 
that by which " stupid school-mistresses commonly pre- 
vent the girls in their charge from the spontaneous 
physical activites they would indulge in, and so render 
them comparatively incapable of taking care of them- 
selves in circumstances of peril." 

Indirect self-preservation, Mr. Spencer believes, may be 
much assisted by a knowledge of physiology. "Dis- 
eases are often contracted, our members are often 
injured, by causes which superior knowledge would 
avoid." I believe these are not the only grounds on 
which the advocates of physiology urge its claim to be 
admitted into the curriculum; but these, if they can be 
established, are no doubt very important. Is it true, 
however, that doctors preserve their own life and health 
by their knowledge of physiology ? I think the matter 



SELF-PRESERVATIYE KNOWLEDGE. 229 

is open to dispute. Mr. Spencer does not. He says 
very truly, that many a man would blush if convicted 
of ignorance about the pronunciation of Iphigenia, or 
about the labors of Hercules, who, nevertheless, would 
not scruple to acknowledge that he had never heard of 
the Eustachian tubes, and could not tell the normal rate 
of pulsation. " So terribly," adds Mr. Spencer, " in our 
education does the ornamental override the useful ! " 
But this is begging the question. At present classics 
form part of the instruction given to every gentleman, 
and physiology does not. This is the simpler form of 
Mr. Spencer's assertion about the labors of Hercules, 
and the Eustachian tubes, and no one denies it. But 
we are not so well agreed on the comparative value of 
these subjects. In his Address at St. Andrews, Mr, 
Mill showed that he at least was not convinced of the 
uselessness of classics, and Mr. Spencer does not tell us 
how the knowledge of the normal state of pulsation is 
useful; how, to use his own test, *'it influences action." 
However, whether we admit the claims of physiology or 
not, we shall probably allow that there are certain phys- 
iological facts and rules of health, the knowledge of 
which would be of great practical value, and should 
therefore be imparted to every one. Here the doctor 
should come to the schoolmaster's assistance, and give 
him a manual from which to teach them. 

Next in order of importance, according to Mr. Spencer, 
<3omes the knowledge which aids indirect self-preserva- 
tion by facilitating the gaining of a livlihood. Here Mr. 
Spencer thinks it necessary to prove to us that such 
sciences as mathematics and physics and biology under- 
lie all the practical arts and business of life. No one 



230 HEEBERT SPENCER. 

will think of joining issue with him on this point; but 
the question still remains, what influence should this have 
on education? " Teach science," says Mr. Spencer. "A 
grounding in science is of great importance, both because 
it prepares for all this (business of life,) and because 
rational knowledge has an immense superiority over em- 
pirical knowledge." Should we teach all sciences to 
every body? This is clearly impossible. Should we, then, 
decide for each child what is to be his particular means 
of money-getting, and instruct him in those sciences 
which will be most useful in that business or profession? 
In other words, should we have a separate school for 
each calling ? The only attempt of this kind which has 
been made is, I believe, the institution of Handelsclmlen 
(commercial schools) in Germany. In them, youths of 
fifteen or sixteen enter for a course of two or three years'" 
instruction which aims exclusively at fitting them for 
commerce. But, in this case, their general education is 
already finished. With us, the lad commonly goes to 
work at the business itself quite as soon as he has the 
faculties for learning the sciences connected with it. If 
the school sends him to it with a love of knowledge, and 
with a mind well disciplined to acquire knowledge, this 
will be of more value to him than any special informa- 
tion. 

As Mr. Spencer is here considering science merely with 
reference to its importance in earning a livelihood, it is 
not beside the question to remark, that in a great num- 
ber of instances, the knowledge of the science which 
underlies an operation confers no practical ability what- 
ever. No one sees the better for understanding the 
structure of the eye and the undulatory theory of lights 



MONEY-GETTING KNOWLEDGE. 231 

In swimming and rowing, a senior wrangler has no ad- 
vantage over a man who is entirely ignorant about the 
laws of fluid pressure. As far as money-getting is con- 
cerned, then, science will not be found to be universally 
serviceable. Mr. Spencer gives instances, indeed, where 
science would prevent very expensive blundering; but 
the true inference is, not that the blunderers should learn 
science, but that they should mind their own business, 
and take the opinion of scientific men about theirs. 
" Here is a mine," says he, ** in the sinking of which 
many shareholders ruined themselves, from not knowing 
that a certain fossil belonged to the old red sandstone, 
below which no coal is found." Perhaps they were mis- 
led by the little knowledge which Pope tells us is a dan- 
gerous thing. If they had been entirely ignorant, they 
would surely have called in a professional geologist, 
whose opinion would have been more valuable than their 
own, even though geology had taken the place of clas- 
sics in their schooling. " Daily are men induced to aid 
in carrying out inventions which a mere tyro in science 
could show to be futile." But these are men whose 
function it would always be to lose money, not make it, 
whatever you might teach them.* I have great doubt, 
therefore, whether the learning of sciences will ever be 
found a ready way of making a fortune. But directly 
we get beyond the region of pounds, shillings, and pence, 
I agree most cordially with Mr. Spencer that a rational 
knowledge has an immense superiority over empirical 
knowledge. And, as a part of their education, boys 

* " The brewer," as Mr. Spencer himself tells us, •' if his business is 
very extensive, finds it pay to keep a chemist on the premises "—pay a 
good deal better, I suspect, than learning chemistry at school. 



232 HERBERT SPENCER. 

should be taught to distinguish the one from the other, 
and to desire rational knowledge. Much might be done 
in this way by teaching, not all the sciences and nothing 
else, but the main principles of some one science, which 
would enable the more intelligent boys to understand 
and appreciate the value of " a rational explanation of 
phenomena." I believe this addition to what was before 
a literary education has already been made in some of 
our leading schools, as Harrow, Rugby, and the City of 
London.* 

Next, Mr. Spencer would have instruction in the 
proper way of rearing off-spring form a part of his cur- 
riculum. There can be no question of the importance of 
this knowledge, and all that Mr. Spencer says of the 
lamentable ignorance of parents is, unfortunately, no 
less undeniable. But could this knowledge be imparted 
early in life ? Young people would naturally take but 
little interest in it. It is by pareuts, or at least by those 
who have some notion of the parental responsibility, 
that this knowledge should be sought. The best way in 
which we can teach the young will be so to bring them 
up that, when they themselves have to rear children, the 
remembrance of their own youth may be a guide and 
not a beacon to them. But more knowledge than this is 



* Mr. Helps, who by taste and talent is eminently literary, put in this 
claim for science more than twenty years ago. " The higher branches of 
method can not be taught at first; but you may begin by teaching orderli- 
ness of mind. Collecting, classifying, contrasting, and weighing facts are 
some of the processes by which method is taught. . . . Scientific 
method may be acquired without many sciences being learnt; but one or 
two great branches of science must be accurately known " (Friends in 
Council, Education.) Mr. Helps, though by his delightful style he never 
gives the reader any notion of over-compression, has told us more truth 
about education in a few pages than one sometimes meets with in a com- 
plete treatise. 



KNOWLEDGE FOR CITIZENSHIP. 233 

necessary, aud I differ from Mr. Spencer only as to the 
proper time for acquiring it. 

Next comes the knowledge which fits a man for the 
discharge of his functions as a citizen, a subject to which 
Dr. Arnold attached great importance at the time of the 
first Reform Bill, and which deserves our attention all 
the more in consequence of the second. But what 
knowledge are we to give for this purpose ? One of the 
subjects which seem especially suitable is history. But 
history, as it is now written, is, according to Mr. Spen- 
cer, useless. "It does not illustrate the right principles 
of political action." "The great mass of historical facts 
are facts from which no conclusions can be drawn — un- 
organizable facts, and, therefore, facts of no service in 
establishing jmnciples of conduct, which is the chief use 
of facts. Read them if you like for amusement, but do 
not flatter yourself they are instructive." About the 
right principles of political action we seem so completely 
at sea that perhaps, the main thing we can do for the 
young is to point out to them the responsibilities which, 
will hereafter devolve upon them, and the danger, both 
to the state and the individual, of just echoing the pop- 
ular cry, without the least reflection, according to our 
present usage. But history, as it is now written by 
great historians, may be of some use in training the 
young both to be citizens and men. " Reading about 
the fifteen decisive battles, or all the battles in history, 
would not make a man a more judicious voter at the 
next election," says Mr. Spencer. But is this true ? 
The knowledge of what has been done in other times, 
even by those whose coronation renders them so distaste- 
ful to Mr. Spencer, is knowledge which influences a man's 



234 HEEBERT SPENCER. 

whole character, and may, therefore, affect particular 
acts, even when we are unable to trace the connection. 
As it has been often said, the effect of reading history- 
is, in some respects the same as that of traveling. Any 
one in Mr. Spencer's vein might ask, *' If a man has seen 
the Alps, of what use will that be to him in weighing 
out groceries ? " Directly, none at all; but indirectly, 
much. The traveled man will not be such a slave to the 
petty views and customs of his trade as the man who 
looks on his county town as the center of the universe. 
The study of history, like traveling, widens the student's 
mental vision, frees him, to some extent, from the 
bondage of the present, and prevents his mistaking con- 
ventionalities for laws of nature. It brings home to 
him, in all its force, the truth that " there are also 
people beyond the mountain " {Sinter dem Berge sind auch 
Leute), that there are higher interests in the world than 
his own business concerns, and nobler men than himself, 
or the best of his acquaintance. It teaches him what 
men are capable of, and thus gives him juster views of 
his race. And to have all this truth worked into the 
mind contributes, perhaps, as largely to '* complete liv- 
ing " as knowledge of the Eustachian tubes, or of the 
normal rate of pulsation.* 

I think, therefore, that the works of great historians 

* Mr. Mill (who, by the way, would leave history entirely to private 
reading, Address at St. Andrews, p. 21) has pointed out that " there is not 
a fact in history which is not susceptible of as many different explanations 
as there are possible theories of human affairs," and that " history is not 
the foundation but the verification of the social science." But he admits 
that " what we know of former ages, like what we know of foreign nations 
is, with all its imperfectness, of much use, by correcting the narrowness 
incident to personal experience." (Dissertations, i., 112.) 



ESTHETIC CULTUEE. 235 

and biographers, which we already possess, may be use- 
fully employed in education. It is difficult to estimate 
the value of history according to Mr. Spencer's idea, as 
it has yet to be written; but I venture to predict than if 
boys, instead of reading about the history of nations in 
connection with their leading men, are required to study 
only " the progress of society," the subject will at once 
lose all its interest for them; and, perhaps, many of the 
facts communicated will prove, after all, no less unor- 
ganizable than the fifteen decisive battles. 

Lastly, we come to that " remaining division of human 
life which includes the relaxations and amusements fill- 
ing leisure hours." Mr. Spencer assures us that he will 
yield to none in the value he attaches to aesthetic culture 
and its pleasures; but if he does not value the fine arts 
less, he values science more; and painting, music, and 
poetry would receive as little encouragement under his 
dictatorship as in the dajs of the Commonwealth. As 
the fine arts and belles-lettres occupy the leisure part of 
life, so should they occupy the leisure part of education." 
This language is rather obscure; but the only meaning I 
can attach to it is, that music, drawing, poetry, etc., may 
be taught if time can be found when all other knowledges 
are provided for. This reminds me of the author whose 
works are so valuable that they will be studied when- 
Shakespeare is forgotten — but not before. Any one of 
the sciences which Mr. Spencer considers so necessary 
might employ a lifetime. Where, then, shall we look 
for the leisure part of education when education includes 
them all?* 

* It is difficult to treat seriously the arguments by which Mr. Spencer 
endeavors to show that a knowledge of science is necessary for the prac- 



236 HEEBERT SPENCER. 

But if, adopting Mr. Spencer's own measure, we esti- 
mate the value of knowledge by its influence on action, 
we shall probably rank "accomplishments" much liigher 
than they have hitherto been placed in the schemes of 
educationists. Knowledge and skill connected with the 
business of life are, of necessity, acquired in the dis- 
charge of business. But the knowledge and skill which 
make our leisure valuable to ourselves, and a source of 
pleasure to others, can seldom be gained after the work 
of life is begun. And yet every day a man may bene- 
fit by possessing such an ability, or may suffer from the 
want of it. One whose eyesight has been trained by 



tice or the enjoyment of the fine arts. Of course, the highest art of every 
kind is based on science, that is, on truths which science talces cognizance 
of and explains; but it does not therefore foUow that "without science 
there can be neither perfect production nor full appreciation." Mr. Spen- 
cer tells us of mistakes which John Lewis and Kossetti have made for want 
of science. Very likely: and had those gentlemen devoted much of their 
time to science we should never have heard of their blunders— or of their 
pictures either. If they were to paint a piece of woodwork, a carpenter 
might, perhaps, detect something amiss in the mitering. If they painted 
a wall, a bricklayer might point out that with their arrangement of 
stretchers and headers the wall would tumble down for want of a proper 
bond. But even Mr. Spencer would not wish them to spend their time in 
mastering the technicalities of every handicraft, in order to avoid these 
inaccuracies. It is the business of the painter to give us form and color 
as they reveal themselves to the eye, not to prepare illustrations of scien- 
tific text-books. The physical sciences, however, are only part of the 
painter's necessary acquirements, according to Mr. Spencer. " He must 
also understand how the minds of spectators will be atfected by the sev- 
eral peculiarities of his work— a question in psychology!" Still more 
surprising is Mr. Spencer's dictum about poetry. " Its rhythm, its strong 
and numerous metaphors, its hyperboles, its violent inversions, are simply 
exaggerations of the traits of excited speech. To be good, therefore, 
poetry must pay attention to those laws of nervous action which excited 
speech obeys." It is difficult to see how poetry can pay attention to any- 
thing. The poet, of course, must not violate those laws, but, if he has 
paid atte7ition to them in composing, he will do well to present his MS. to 
the local newspaper. 



VALUE OF '^ ACCOMPLISHMEliTS." 23'Z 

drawing and painting finds objects of interest all around 
him, to which other people are blind. A primrose by 
the river's brim is, perhaps, more to him who has a feel- 
ing for its form and color than even to the scientific 
student, who can tell all about its classification and com- 
ponent parts. A knowledge of music is often of the 
greatest practical service, as by virtue of it, its posses- 
sor is valuable to his associates, to say nothing of his 
having a constant source of pleasure and a means of 
recreation which is most precious as a relief from the cares 
of life. Of far greater importance is the knowledge of 
our best poetry. One of the first reforms in our school- 
course would have been, I should have thought, to give 
this knowledge a much more prominent place; but Mr. 
Spencer consigns it, with music and [drawing, to "the 
leisure part of education." Whether a man who was 
engrossed by science, who had no knowledge of the 
fiue arts except as they illustrated scientific laws, no ac- 
quaintance with the lives of great men, or with any 
history but sociology, and who studied the thoughts and 
emotions expressed by our great poets merely with'a 
view to their psychological classification — whether such 
a man could be said to "live completely" is a question 
to which every one, not excepting Mr. Spencer himself, 
would probably return the same answer. And yet this 
is the kind of man which Mr. Spencer's system would 
produce where it was most successful. 

Let me now briefly sum up the conclusions arrived at, 
and consider how far I differ from Mr. Spencer. I be- 
lieve that there is no one study which is suited to train 
the faculties of the mind at every stage of its develop- 
ment, and that when we have decided on the necessity 



238 HERBERT SPENCER. 

of this or that knowledge, we must consider further 
what is the right time for acquiring it. I believe that 
intellectual education should aim, not so much at com- 
municating facts, however valuable, as at showing the 
boy what true knowledge is, and giving him the power 
and the disposition to acquire it. I believe that the ex- 
clusively scientific teaching which Mr. Spencer approves 
would not effect this. It would lead at best to a very- 
one-sided development (>f the mind. It might fail to 
engage the pupil's interest sufficiently to draw out his 
faculties, and in this case the net outcome of his school- 
days would be no larger than at present. Of the knowl- 
edges which Mr. Spencer recommends for special ob- 
jects, some, I think, would not conduce to the object, 
and some could not be communicated early in life. (1.) 
For indirect self-preservation we do not require to 
know physiology, but the result of physiology. (2.) 
The science which bears on special pursuits in life has 
not in many cases any pecuniary value, and although it 
is most desirable that every one should study the science 
which makes his work intelligible to him, this must 
usually be done when his schooling is over. The school 
will have done its part if it has accustomed him to the 
intellectual processes by which sciences are learned, and 
has given him an intelligent appreciation of their value.* 
(3.) The right way of rearing and training children 



♦Speaking of law, medicine, engineering, and the industrial arts, Mr. 
Mill remarks: "Whether those whose specialty they are will learn them 
as a branch of intelligence or as a mere trade, and whether having learnt 
them, they will make a wise and conscientious use of them, or the reverse, 
depends less on the manner in which they are taught their profession, 
than upon what sort of mind they bring to it— what kind of intelligence 
and of conscience the general system of education has developed in 
them."— Address at St. Andrews, p. 6. 



WHAT WE SHOULD NOT TEACH. 239 

should be studied indeed, but not by the children them- 
selves. (4.) The knowledge which fits a man to dis- 
charge his duties as a citizen is of great importance, 
and, as Dr. Arnold pointed out, is likely to be entirely 
neglected by those who have to struggle for a liveli- 
hood. The schoolmaster should, therefore, by no means 
neglect this subject with those of his pupils whose 
schooldays will soon be over;* but, probably, all that he 
can do is to cultivate in them a sense of the citizen's 
duty, and a capacity for being their own teachers.* 
(5.) The knowledge of poetry, belles-lettres, and the 
fine arts, which Mr. Spencer hands over to the leisure 
part of education, is the only knowledge in his pro- 
gramme which I think should most certainly form a 
prominent part in the curriculum of every school. 

I therefore difl^er, though with great respect, from the 
conclusions at which Mr. Spencer has arrived. But I 
heartily agree with him that we are bound to inquire 
into the relative value of knowledges, and if we take, 
as I should willingly do, Mr. Spencer's test, and ask how 
does this or that knowledge influence action (including 
in our inquiry its influence on mind and character, 
through which it bears upon action), I think we should 
banish from our schools much that has hitherto been 
taught in them, besides those old tormenters of youth 
(laid, 1 fancy, at last — requiescant in pace [let them rest in 
peace] ) — the Propria qua Marihus [Things appropriate 
to men] and its kindred absurdities. What we should 
teach is, of course, not so easily decided as what we 
should not. 

* Vide Mill.— Address, p. 67. 



240 HERBERT SPENCER. 

I now come to consider Mr. Spencer's second chapter, 
in which, under the heading of "Intellectual Education," 
he gives an admirable summing up of the main princi- 
ples in which the great writers on the subject have 
agreed, from Comenius downward. These principles 
are, perhaps, not all of them unassailable, and even 
where they are true, many mistakes must be expected 
before we arrive at the best method of applying them; 
but the only reason that can be assigned for the small 
amount of influence they have hitherto exercised is, that 
most teachers are as ignorant of them as of the abstrus- 
est doctrines of Kant and Hegel. 

In stating these principles Mr. Spencer points out that 
they merely form a commencement for a science of edu- 
cation. "Before educational methods can be made to 
harmonize in character and arrangement with the facul- 
ties in the mode and order of unfolding, it is first need- 
ful that we ascertain with some completeness how the 
faculties do unfold. At present we have acquired on this 
point only a few general notions. These general notions 
must be developed in detail — must be transformed into 
a multitude of specific propositions before we can be said 
to possess that science on which the art of education must 
be'based. And then, when we have definitely made out 
in what succession and in what combinations the mental 
powers become active, it remains to choose out of the 
many possible ways of exercising each of them, that 
which best conforms to its natural mode of action. Evi- 
dently, therefore, it is not to be supposed that even our 
most advanced modes of teaching are the right ones, or 
nearly the right ones." It is not to be wondered at that 
we have no science of education. Those who have been 



INTELLECTUAL EDUCATION. 241 

able to observe the phenomena have had no interest in 
generalizing from them. Up to the present time the 
schoolmaster has been a person to whom boys were sent 
to learn Latin and Greek. He has had, therefore, no 
more need of a science than the dancing-mastei*. But the 
present century, which has brought in so many changes 
will not leave the state of education as it found it. Latin 
and Greek, if they are not dethroned in our higher schools, 
will have their despotism changed for a very limited mon- 
archy. A course of instruction certainly without Greek 
and perhaps without Latin will have to be provided for 
middle schools. Juster views are beginning to prevail 
of the schoolmaster's function. It is at length perceived 
that he has to assist the development of the human mind, 
and, perhaps by-and by, he may think it as well to learn 
all he can of that which he is employed in developing. 
When matters have advanced as far as this, we may begin 
to hope for a science of education. In Locke's days he 
could say of physical science that there was no such sci- 
ence in existence. For thousand of years the human race 
had live in ignorance of the simplest laws of the world it 
inhabited. But the true method of inquiring once intro- 
duced, science has made such rapid conquests, and ac- 
quired so great importance, that some of our ablest men 
seem inclined to deny, if not the existence, at least the 
value, of any other kind of knowledge. So, too, when 
teachers seek by actual observation to discover the laws 
of mental development, a science may be arrived at 
which, in its influence on mankind, would, perhaps, rank 
before any we now possess. 

Those who have read the previous Essays will have 
seen in various forms most of the principles which Mr. 



242 HERBERT SPENCER. 

Spencer enumerates, but I gladly avail myself of his as- 
sistance in summing them up. 

1. We should proceed from the simple to the complex, 
both in our choice of subjects and in the way in which 
each subject is taught. We should begin with bat few 
subjects at once, and, successively adding to these, should 
finally carry on all subjects abreast. 

Each larger concept is made by a combination of 
smaller ones, and presupposes them. If this order is not 
attended to in communicating knowledge, the pupil can 
learn nothing but words, and will speedily sink into apa- 
thy and disgust. 

That we must proceed from the known to the unknown 
is something more than a corollary to the above;* be- 
cause not only are new concepts formed by the combina- 
tion of old, but the mind has a liking for what it knows, 
and this liking extends itself to all that can be connected 
with its object. The principle of using the known in 
teaching the unknown is so simple, that all teachers who 
really endeavor to make anything understood, naturally 
adopt it. The traveler who is describing what he has 
seen and what we have not seen tells us that it is in one 
particular like this object, and in another like that ob- 
ject, with which we are already familiar. We combine 
these different concepts we possess, and so get some no- 
tion of things about which we were previously ignorant. 
What is required in our teaching is that the use of the 
known should be employed more systematically. Most 
teachers think of boys who have no school learning as 

* Mr. Spencer does not mention this principle in his enumeration, but, 
no doubt, considers he implies it. 



SUMMARY OF PRINCIPLES. 243 

entirely ignorant. The least reflection shows, however, 
that they know already much more than schools can ever 
teach them. A sarcastic examiner is said to have handed 
a small piece of paper to a student, and told him to write 
iill he knew on it. Perhaps many boys would have no dif- 
ficulty in stating the sum of their school learning within 
very narrow limits; but with other knowledge a child of 
five years old, could he write, might soon fill a volume. 
Our aim should be to connect the knowledge boys bring 
with them to the school-room with that which they are 
to acquire there. I suppose all will allow, whether they 
think it a matter of regret or otherwise, that hardly any- 
thing of the kind has hitherto been attempted. Against 
this state of things I can not refrain from borrowing Mr. 
Spencer's eloquent protest. " Not recognizing the truth 
that the function of books is supplementary — that they 
form an indirect means to knowledge when direct means 
fail, a means of seeing through other men what you can 
not see for yourself, teachers are eager to give second- 
hand facts in place of first-hand facts. Not perceiving 
the enormous value of that spontaneous education which 
goes on in early years, not perceiving that a child's rest- 
less observation, instead of being ignored or checked, 
should be diligently ministered to and made as acurate 
and complete as possible, they insist on occupying its 
eyes and thoughts with things that are, for the time be- 
ing, incomprehensible and repugnant. Possessed by a 
superstition which worships the symbols of knowledge 
instead of the knowledge itself, they do not see that only 
when his acquaintance with the objects and processes of 
the household, the street, and the fields, is becoming tol- 
erably exhaustive, only then should a child be introduced 



244 HERBEET SPENCER. 

to the new sources of information which books supply, 
and this not only because immediate cognition is of far 
greater value than mediate cognition, but also because 
the words contained in books can be rightly interpreted 
into ideas only in proportion to the antecedent experience 
of things."* While agreeing heartily in the spirit of 
this protest, I doubt whether we should wait till the 
child's acquaintance with the objects and processes of 
the household, the street, and the fields, is becoming tol- 
erably exhaustive before we give him instruction from 
books. The point of time which Mr. Spencer indicates 
is, at all events, rather hard to fix, and I should wish to 
connect book-learning as soon as possible with the learn- 
ing that is being acquired in other ways. Thus might 
both the books, and the acts and objects of daily life, win 
an additional interest. If, e. g., the first reading books 
were about the animals, and later on about trees and 
flowers which the children constantly meet with, and their 
attention were kept up by large colored pictures, to which 
the text might refer, the children would soon find both 
pleasure and advantage in reading, and they would look 
at the animals and trees with a keener interest from the 
additional knowledge of them they had derived from 
books. This is, of course, only one small application of 
a very influential principle. 

* After remarking on the wrong order in which subjects are taught, he 
continues, " What with perceptions unnaturally dulled by early thwart- 
ings, and a coerced attention to books, what with the mental confusion 
produced by teaching subjects before they can be understood, and in each 
of them giving generalizations before the facts of which they are the gen- 
eralizations, what with making the pupil a mere passive recipient of 
others' ideas and not in the least leading him to be an active inquirer or 
self-instructor, and what with taxing the faculties to excess, there are^ 
very few minds that become as efficient as they might be." 



LATIN BEFORE ENGLISH. 245 

One marvelous instance of the neglect of this princi- 
ple is found in the practice of teaching Latin grammar 
before English grammar. Respect for the high author- 
ity of Professor Kennedy, who would not have English 
grammar taught at all, prevents my expressing myself as 
strongly as I should like in this matter. As Professor 
Seeley has so well pointed out, children bring with them 
to school the knowledge of language in its concrete form. 
They may soon be taught to observe the language they 
already know, and to find, almost for themselves, some 
of the main divisions of words in it. But, instead of 
availing himself of the child's previous knowledge, the 
schoolmaster takes a new and difficult language, differ- 
ing as much as possible from English; a new and difficult 
science, that of grammar, conveyed, too, in a new and 
difficult terminology; and all this he tries to teach at the 
same time. The consequence is that the science is de- 
stroyed, the terminology is either misunderstood, or, 
more probably, associated with no ideas, and even the 
language for which every sacrifice is made, is found, in 
nine cases out of ten, never to be acquired at all.* 



* A class of boys whom I once took in Latin Delectus denied, with the 
utmost confidence, when I questioned them on the subject, that they were 
any such things in English as verbs and substantives. On another occa- 
sion, I saw a poor boy of nine or ten caned, because, when he had said 
that pruflciscor was a deponent verb, he could not say what a deponent 
■verb was. Even if he had remembered the inaccurate grammar definition 
expected of him, " A deponent verb is a verb with a passive form and an 
active meaning," his comprehension of proficiscor would have been no 
greater. It is worth observing that, even when offending grievously in 
great matters against the principle of connecting fresh knowledge with 
the old, teachers are sometimes driven to it in small. They find that it is 
better for boys to see that lignum is like regnum, and laudare like amare, 
than simply to learn that lignum is of the Second Declension, and laudare 
of the First Conjugation. If boys had to learn, by mere efiort of memory, 
the particular declension and conjugation of Latin words before they were 



246 HERBERT SPENCER. 

2. " All development is an advance from the indefinite 
to the definite." 

I do not feel very certain of the truth of this principlcy 
or of its application, if true. Of course, a child's intel- 
lectual conceptions are at first vague, and we should not 
forget this; but it is rather a fact than a principle. 

3. " Our lessons ought to start from the concrete, and 
end in the abstract." What Mr. Spencer says under 
this head well deserves the attention of all teachers, 
*' General formulas which men have devised to express 
groups of details, and which have severally simplified 
their conceptions by uniting many facts into one fact, 
they have supposed must simplify the conceptions of a 
child also. They have forgotten that a generalization is 
simple only in comparison with the whole mass of par- 
ticular truths it comprehends; that it is more complex 
than any one of these truths taken simply; that only, 
after many of these single truths have been acquired, 
does the generalization ease the memory and help the 
reason; and that, to a mind not possessing these single 
truths, it is necessarily a mystery.* Thus, confounding 
two kinds of simplification, teachers have constantly 
erred by setting out with *' first principles," a proceed- 
ing essentially, though not apparently, at variance with 
the primary rule (of proceeding from the simple to the 
complex), which implies that the mind should be intro- 

taught anything about declensions or conjugations, this would be as sens- 
ible as the method adopted in some other instances, and the teachers 
might urge, as usual, that the information would come in useful afterward. 

* " General terms are, as it were, but the indorsements upon the bun- 
dles of our ideas; they are useful to those who have collected a number 
of ideas, but utterly useless to those who have no collections ready for 
classification."— Edgeworth's Practical Education, i. 91. 



CONCRETE BEFORE ABSTRACT. 247 

duced to principles through the medium of examples, 
and so should be led from the particular to the general, 
from the concrete to the abstract." In conformity with 
this principle, Pestalozzi made the actual counting of 
things precede the teaching of abstract rules in arithme- 
tic. Basedow introduced weights and measures into the 
school, and Mr. Spencer describes some exercise in cut- 
ting out geometrical figures in cardboard as a prepara- 
tion for geometry. The difficulty about such instruction 
is that it requires apparatus, and apparatus is apt to get 
lost or out of order. But, if apparatus is good for any- 
thing at all, it is worth a little trouble. There is a 
tendency in the minds of many teachers to depreciate 
" mechanical appliances." Even a decent blackboard is 
not always to be found in our higher schools. But, 
though such appliances will not enable a bad master to 
teach well, nevertheless, other things being equal, the 
master will teach better with them than without them. 
There is little credit due to him for managing to dis- 
pense with apparatus. An author might as well pride 
himself on being saving in pens and paper. 

4. "The genesis of knowledge in the individual must 
follow the same course as the genesis of knowledge in 
the race." This is a thesis on which I have no opinion 
to offer. It was, I believe, first maintained by Pes- 
talozzi. 

5. From the above principle Mr. Spencer infers that 
every study should have a purely experimental intro- 
duction, thus proceeding through an empirical stage to 
a rational. 

6. A second conclusion which Mr. Spencer draws is 
that, in education, the process of self-development 



248 HERBERT SPENCER. 

should be encouraged to the utmost. Children should 
be led to make their own investigations, and to draw 
their own inferences. They should be told as little as 
possible, and induced to discover as much as possible. 
I quite agree with Mr. Spencer that this principle can 
not be too strenuously insisted on, though it obviously 
demands a high amount of intelligence in the teacher. 
But if education is to be a training of the faculties, if 
it is to prepare the pupil to teach himself, something 
more is needed than simply to pour in knowledge and 
make the pupil reproduce it. The receptive and repro- 
ductive faculties form but a. small portion of a child's 
powers, and yet the only portion which many school- 
masters seek to cultivate. It is, indeed, not easy to get 
beyond this point; but the impediment is in us, not in 
the children. "Who can watch," asks Mr. Spencer, 
" the ceaseless observation, and inquiry, and inference, 
going on in a child's mind, or listen to its acute remarks 
in matters within the range of its faculties, without per- 
ceiving that these powers it manifests, if brought to 
bear systematically upon studies within the same range, 
would readily master them without help ? This need 
for perpetual telling results from our stupidity, not 
from the child's. We drag it away from the facts in 
which it is interested, and which it is actively assimilat- 
ing of itself. We put before it facts far too complex 
for it to understand, and therefore distasteful to it. 
Finding that it will not voluntarily acquire these facts, 
we thrust them into its mind by force of threats and pun- 
ishment. By thus denying the knowledge it craves, 
and cramming it with knowledge it can not digest, we 
produce a morbid state of its faculties, and a consequent 



SELF-DEVELOPMENT ENCOURAGED. 249 

disgust for knowledge in general. And when, as a re- 
sult, partly of the stolid indolence we have brought on, 
and partly of still-continued unfitness in its studies, the 
child can understand nothing without explanation, and 
becomes a mere passive recipient of our instruction, we 
infer that education must necessarily be carried on thus. 
Having by our method induced helplessness, we make 
the helplessness a reason for our method." It is, of 
course, much easier to point out defects than to remedy 
them: but every one who has observed the usual indif- 
ference of school-boys to their work, and the waste of 
time consequent on their inattention, or only half- 
hearted attention, to the matter before them, and then 
thinks of the eagerness with which the same boys throw 
themselves into the pursuits of their play-hours, will 
feel a desire to get at the cause of this difference; and, 
perhaps, it may seem to him partly accounted for by 
the fact that their school-work makes a monotonous 
demand on a single faculty — the memory. 

7. This brings me to the last of Mr. Spencer's princi- 
ples of intellectual education. Instruction must excite 
the interest of the pupils, and therefore be pleasurable to 
them. " Nature has made the healthful exercise of our 
faculties both of mind and body pleasurable. It is true 
that some of the highest mental powers as yet but little 
developed in the race, and congenitally possessed in any 
considerable degree only by the most advanced, are 
indisposed to the amount of exertion required of 
them. But these in virtue of their very complexity 
will in a normal course of culture corae last 
into exercise, and will, therefore, have no demands 
made on them until the pupil has arrived at an age 



250 HERBERT SPENCER. 

when ulterior motives can be brought into play, and 
an indirect pleasure made to counterbalance a direct dis- 
pleasure. With all faculties lower than these, however, 
the immediate gratification consequent on activity is the 
normal stimulus, and under good management the only 
needful stimulus. When we have to fall back on some 
other, we must take the fact as evidence that we are on 
the wrong track. Experience is daily showing with 
greater clearness that there is always a method to be 
found productive of interest — even of delight — and it 
ever turns out that this is the method proved by all other 
tests to be the right one." 

As far as I have had the means of judging, I have 
found that the majority of teachers reject this principle. 
If you ask them why, most of them will you that it is 
impossible to make school-work interesting to children. 
A large number also hold that it is not desirable. Let us 
consider these two points separately. 

Of course, if it is not possible to get children to take 
interest in anything they could be taught in school, there 
is an end of the matter. But no one really goes as far 
as this. Every teacher finds that some of the things boys 
are taught they like better than others, and perhaps that 
one boy takes to one subject and another to another, and 
he also finds, both of classes and individuals, that they 
always get on best with what they like best. The ut- 
most that can be maintained is, then, that some subjects 
which must be taught will not interest the majority of 
the learners. And if it be once admitted that it is desir* 
able to make learning pleasant and interesting to our 
pupils, this principle will influence us to some extent in 
the subjects we select for teaching, and still more in the 



INSTEUCTION MADE PLEASURABLE. 251 

methods by which we endeavor to teach them. I say we 
fchall be guided to some extent in the selection of subjects- 
There are theorists who assert that nature gives to young 
minds a craving for their proper aliment, so that they 
should be taught only only what they show an inclina- 
tion for. But surely our natural inclinations in this mat- 
ter, as in others, are neither on the one hand to be ig- 
nored, nor on the other to be uncontrolled by such mo- 
tives as our reason dictates to us. We at length perceive 
this in the physical nurture of our children. Locke directs 
that children are to have very little sugar or salt. "Sweet- 
meats of all kinds are to be avoided," says he, " which, 
whether they do more harm to the maker or eater is not 
easy to tell." (Ed. § 20.) Now, however, doctors have 
found out that young people's taste for sweets should in 
moderation be gratified, that they require sugar as much 
as they require any other kind of nutriment. But no one 
would think of feeding his children entirely on sweet- 
meats, or even of letting them have an unlimited supply 
of plum-puddings and hardbake. If we follow out this 
analogy in nourishing the mind, we shall, to some extent 
gratify a child's taste for '^stories," whilst we also pro- 
vide a large amount of more solid fare. But although 
we should certainly not ignore our children's likes and 
dislikes in learning, or in anything else, it is easy to at- 
tach too much importance to them. Dislike very often 
proceeds from mere want of insight into the subject. 
When a boy has " done " the First Book of Euclid with- 
out knowing how to judge of the size of an angle, or the 
Second Book without forming any conception of a rect- 
angle, no one can be surprised at his not liking Euclid. 
And then the failure which is really due to bad teaching 



252 HERBERT SPENCER. 

is attributed by the master to the stupidity of his pupils, 
and by the pupil to the dullness of the subject. If mas- 
ters really desired to make learning a pleasure to their 
pupils, I think they would find that much might be done 
to effect this without any alteration in the subjects taught. 
But the present dullness of school-work is not without 
its defenders. They insist on the importance of break- 
ing in the mind to hard work. This can only be done, 
they say, by tasks which are repulsive to it. The school- 
boy does not like, and ought not to like, learning Latin 
grammar any more than the colt should find pleasure in 
running round in a circle: the very fact that these things 
are not pleasant makes them beneficial. Perhaps a cer- 
tain amount of such training may train down the mind 
and qualify it for some drudgery from which it might 
otherwise revolt; but if this result is attained, it is at- 
tained at the sacrifice of the intellectual activity which 
is necessary for any higher function. As Carlyle says, 
when speaking of routine work generally, you want 
nothing but a sorry nag to draw your sand-cart; your 
high-spirited Arab will be dangerous in such a capacity. 
But who would advocate for aJl colts a training which 
should render them fit for nothing but such humble toil? 
I have spoken elsewherere on this subject, and here I 
will merely express my strong conviction that boys' minds 
are frequently dwarfed, and their interests in intellec- 
tual pursuits blighted, by the practice of employing the 
first years of their school life in learning by heart things 
which it is quite impossible for them to understand or 
care for. Teachers set out by assuming that little boys 
can not understand anything, and that all we can do 
^th them is to keep them quiet and cram them with 



MENTAL DISCIPLINE. 253 

forms which will come in u&eful at a later age. When 
the boys have been taught on this system for two or 
three years, their teacher complains that they are stupid 
and inattentive, and that so long as they can say a thing 
by heart they never trouble themselves to understand it. 
In other words, the teacher grumbles at them for doing 
precisely what they have been taught to do, for repeat- 
ing words without any thought of their meaning. 

In this very important matter I am fully alive to the 
difference between theory and practice. It is so easy to 
recommend that boys should be got to understand and 
take an interest in their work — so difficult to carry out 
the recommendation! Grown people can hardly con- 
ceive that words which have in their minds been associ- 
ated with familiar ideas from time immemorial, are mere 
sounds in the mouths of their pupils. The teacher thinks 
he is begining at the begining if he says that a transitive 
verb must govern an accusative, or that all the angles of 
a square are right angles. He gives his pupils credit for 
innate ideas up to this point, at all events, and advancing 
on this supposition he finds that he can get nothing out 
of them but memory-work, so he insists on this that his 
time and theirs may not seem to be wholly wasted. The 
great difficulty of teaching well, however, is after all 
but a poor excuse for contentedly teaching badly, and it 
would be a great step in advance if teachers in general 
were as dissatisfied with themselves as they usually are 
with their pupils.* 

* Mr. Spencer and Professor Tyndall appeal to the results of experi- 
ence as justifying a more rational method of teaching. Speaking of geo- 
metrical deductions, Mr. Spencer says : " It has repeatedly occurred that 
those who have been stupefied by the ordinary school-drill— by its ab- 



254 .HERBERT SPENCER. 

I do not purpose following Mr. Spencer through his 
chapters on moral and physical edu'^ation. In practice 
I find I can draw no line between moral and religious 
education; so the discussion of one without the other 
has not for me much interest. Mr. Spencer has some 
very valuable remarks on physical education which I 
could do little more than extract, and 1 have already 
made too many quotations from a work which will be 
in the hands of most of my readers. 

Mr. Spencer differs very widely from the great body 
of our schoolmasters. I have ventured in turn to differ 
on some points from Mr. Spencer; but I am none the 
less conscious that he has written not only one of the 
most readable, but also one of the most important books 
on education in the English language. 

[The best editiOQ of Speacer's " Education " is Appleton's, price in 
clotli 11/25, in paper 50 cts. It is also published in the Humboldt Library 
at 15 cts. j 

stract formulas, its wearisome tasks, its cramming— have suddenly had 
their intellects roused by thus ceasing to make them passive recipients, 
and induciag them to become active discoverers. The discouragement 
caused by bad teaching having been diminished by a little sympathy, and 
sutiflcient perseverance excited to achieve a tirst success, there arises a 
revolution of feeling affecting the whole nature. They no longer find 
themselves incompetent; they, too, can do something. And gradually, as 
sui^cess follows success, the incubus of despair disappears, and they at- 
tack the difficulties of their other studies with a courage insuring con- 
quest." 



XI. 
THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 

One ]of the great wants of middle-class education at 
present, is an ideal to work toward. Our old public 
schools have such an ideal. The model public school- 
man is a gentleman who is an elegant Latin and Greek 
scholar. True, this may not be a very good ideal, and 
some of our ablest men, both literary and scientific, 
are profoundly dissatisfied with it. But, so long as it is 
maintained, all questions of reform are comparatively 
simple. In middle-class schools, on the other hand, there 
is no terminus ad quern [end to work toward]. A number 
of boys are got together, and the question arises, not 
simply how to teach, but what to teach. Where the mas- 
ters are not university men, they are, it may be, not men 
of broad views or high culture. Of course no one will 
suppose me ignorant of the fact that a great number of 
teachers who have never been at a university, are both 
enlightened and highly cultivated ; and also that many 
teachers who have taken degrees, even in honors, are 
neither. But, speaking broadly of the two classes, I 
may fairly assume that the non-university men are infe- 
rior in these respects to the graduates. If not, our uni- 
versities should be reformed on Carlyle's " live- coal " 
principle, without further loss of time. Many non -uni- 
versity masters have ^been engaged in teaching ever 
since they were boys themselves, and teaching is a very 



256 THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 

narrowing occupation. They are apt therefore to be 
careless of general principles, and to aim merely at 
storing their pupils' memory with facts — facts about 
language, about history, about geography, without 
troubling themselves to consider what is and what is not 
wortli knowing, or what faculties the boys have, and 
how they should be developed. The consequence is 
their boys get up, for the purpose of forgetting with all 
convenient speed, quantities of details about as instructive 
and entertaining as the Propria quce marihus. such as the 
division of England under the Heptarchy, the battles in 
the wars of the Roses, and lists of geographical names. 
Where the masters are university men, they have rather 
a contempt for this kind of cramming, which makes 
them do it badly, if they attempt it at all: but they are 
driven to this teaching in many cases because they do 
not know what to substitute in its place. Their own 
education was in classics and mathematics. Their 
pupils are too young to have much capacity for mathe- 
matics, and they will leave school too soon to get any 
sound knowledge of classics, so the strength of the 
teaching ought clearly not to be thrown into these sub- 
jects. But the master really knows no other. He soon 
finds that he is not much his pupils' superior in acquaint- 
ance with, the theory of the English language or with 
history and geography. There are not many men with 
sufficient strength of will to study whilst their energies 
are taxed by teaching, and standard books are not al- 
ways within reach : so the master is forced to content 
himself with hearing lessons in a perfunctory way out 
of dreary school-books. Hence it comes to pass that he 
goes on teaching subjects of which he himself is ignor- 



DISCIPLINE OP DRY STUDIES. 257 

ant, subjects, too, of which he does not recognize the 
importance, with an enlightened disbelief in his own 
method of tuition. He finds it up-hill work, to be sure 
— labor of Sisyphus, in fact — and is conscious that his 
pupils do not get on, however hard he may try to drive 
them; but he never hoped for success in his teaching, so 
the want of it does not distress him. I may be sus- 
pected of caricature, but not, I think, by university men 
who have themselves had to teach anything besides 
classics and mathematics. 

If there is any truth in what I have been saying^ 
school-teaching, in subjects other than classics and math- 
ematics (which I am not now considering), is very common- 
ly a failure. And a failure it must remain until boys can 
be got to work with a will, in other words, to feel interest 
in the subject taught. I know there is a strong pre- 
judice in some people's minds against the notion of 
making learning pleasant. They remind us that school 
should be a preparation for after-life. After-life will 
bring with it an immense amount of drudgery. If, they 
say, things at school are made too easy and pleasant 
(words, by the way, very often and very erroneously 
confounded), school will cease to give the proper disci- 
pline : boys will be turned out not knowing what hard 
work is, which, after all, is the most important lesson 
that can be taught them. In these views I sincerely 
concur, so far as this, at least, that we want boys to work 
hard and vigorously to go through necessary drudgery, 
i. e., labor in itself disagreeable. But this result is not 
attained by such a system as I have described. Boys do 
not learn to work hard, but in a dull, stupid way, with 
most of their faculties lying dormant, and though they 



258 THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 

are put through a vast amount of drudgery, they seem 
as incapable of throwing any energy into it, as prisoners 
on the tread-mill. I think we shall find,'on consideration, 
that no one succeeds in any occupation unless that oc- 
cupation is interesting, either in itself or from some ob- 
ject that is to be obtained by means of it. Only when 
such an interest is aroused is energy possible. No one 
will deny that, as a rule, the most successful men are 
those for whom their employment has the greatest at- 
tractions. We should be sorry to give ourselves up to 
the treatment of a doctor who thought the study of dis- 
ease mere drudgery, or a dentist who felt a strong 
repugnance to operating on teeth. No doubt, the suc- 
cessful man in every pursuit has to go through a great 
deal of drudgery, but he has a general interest in the 
subject, which extends, partially at least, to its most 
wearisome details ; his energy, too, is excited by the de- 
sire of what the drudgery will gain for him.* 

* On this subject I can quote the authority of a great observer of the 
mind— no less a man, indeed, than Wordsworth. He speaks of the "grand 
elementary principle of pleasure, by which man knows, and feels, and 
lives, and moves. We have no sympathy," he continues, " but what is 
propagated by pleasure— I would not be misunderstood— but wherever we 
sympathize with pain, it will be found that the sympathy is produced and 
carried on by subtle combinations with pleasure. We have no knowledge, 
that is, no general principles drawn from the contemplation of particular 
facts, but what has been built up by pleasure, and exists in us by pleasure 
alone. The man of science, the chemist, and mathematician, whatever 
difficulties and disgusts they may have to struggle with, know and feel 
this. However painful may be the objects with which the anatomist's 
knowledge may be connected, he feels that his knowledge is pleasure, and 
whenhe has no pleasure he has no Tinowledge."—Tret&ce to second edition 
of [Lyrical Ballads. If we accept Professor Bain's doctrine, " States of 
pleasure are connected with an increase, and states of pain with a dimi- 
nution, of some or all of the vital functions," it will follow that the healthy 
discharge of the functions, either of the mind or the body, must be pleas- 
urable. However, I merely suggest this for consideration. 



STUDY MUST BE INTERESTING. 259 

Observe, that although T would have boys take pleas- 
ure in their work, T regard the pleasure as a means, not 
an end. If it could be proved that the mind was best 
trained by the most repulsive exercises, I should most 
certainly enforce them. But I do not think that the 
mind is benefited by galley-slave labor: indeed, hardly 
any of its faculties are capable of such labor. We can 
oompel a boy to learn a thing by heart, but we can not 
compel him to wish to understand it; and the intellect 
does not act without the will. Hence, when anything is 
required which can not be performed by the memory 
alone, the driving system utterly breaks down; and even 
the memory, as I hope to show presently, works much 
more effectually in matters about which the mind feels 
an interest. Indeed, the mind without sympathy and 
interest is like the sea-anemone when the tide is down, 
an unlovely thing, closed against external influences, 
enduring existence as best it can. But let it find itself 
in a more congenial element, and it opens out at once, 
shows altogether unexpected capacities, and eagerly 
assimilates all the proper food that comes within its 
reach. Our school-teaching is often little better than 
an attempt to get sea-aneraones to flourish on dry land. 

We see, then, that a boy, before he can throw energy 
into study, must find that study interesting in itself, or in 
its results. 

Some subjects, properly taught, are interesting in 
themselves. 

Some subjects may be interesting to older and more 
thoughtful boys, from a perception of their usefulness. 

All subjects may be made interesting by emulation. 

Hardly any effort is made in some schools to interest 



260 THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 

the younger children in their work, and yet no effort can 
be, as the Germans say, more " rewarding." The teacher 
of children has this advantage, that his pupils are never 
dull and listless, as youths are apt to be. If they are 
not attending to him, they very soon give him notice of 
it, and if he has the sense to see that their inattention is 
his fault, not theirs, this will save him much annoyance 
and them much misery. He has, too, another advan- 
tage, which gives him the power of gaining their atten- 
tion — their emulation is easily excited. In the Waisen- 
haus at Halle I once heard a class of very young chil- 
dren, none of them much above six years old, perform 
feats of mental arithmetic quite beyond their age (I 
wished their teacher had not been so successful), and I 
well remember the pretty eagerness with which each 
child held out a little hand and shouted, " Mich ! " [Me !] 
to gain the privilege of answering. 

Then again, there are many subjects in which children 
take an interest. Indeed, ail visible things, especially 
animals, are much more to them than to us. A child 
has made acquaintance with all the animals in the neigh- 
borhood, and can tell you much more about the house 
and its surroundings than you know yourself. But all 
this knowledge and interest you would wish forgotten 
directly he comes into school. Reading, writing, and 
figures are taught in the driest manner. The first two 
are in themselves not uninteresting to the child, as he 
has something to do, and young people are much more 
ready to do anything than to learn anything. But when 
lessons are given the child to learn, they are not about 
things concerning which he has ideas, and feels an inter- 
est, but you teach him the Catechism — mere sounds — and^ 



OBJECT-LESSONS INEFFECTIVE. 261 

that Alfred (to him only a name) came to the throne in 
871, though he has no notion what the throne is, or 
what 871 means. The child learns the lesson with much 
trouble and small profit, bearing the infliction with what 
patience he can, till he escapes out of school, and begins 
to learn much faster on a very different system. 

An attempt has been made by the Pestalozzians to 
remedy all this. They insist strongly on the necessity 
of teaching children about things, and of appealing to 
their senses. But, to judge from the Cheam manual,* 
they have succeeded merely in proving that lessons on 
things may be made as tiresome as any other lessons. 
They hold up an object, say a piece of sponge, and run 
through all the adjectives which can possibly be applied 
to it. " This is sponge. Sponge is an animal product. 
Sponge is amorphous. Sponge is porous. Sponge is ab- 
sorbent," etc., etc. I have no practical acquaintance 
with this method, but confess I do not like the look of 
it from a distance. f 

We can not often introduce into the school the thing, 
much less the animal, which children would care to see, 
but we can introduce what will please the children as 
well, in some cases even better, viz., good pictures. A 
teacher who could draw boldly on the blackboard, would 
have no dfficulty in arresting the children's attention. 
But, of course, few can do this. Pictures must, there- 
fore, be provided for him. A good deal has been done of 
late years in the way of illustrating children's books, and 
even childhood must be the happier for such pictures as 

* [See note, pap;e 195.] 

t Mr. Herbert Spencer has conclusively shown Pestalozzian practices 
are often at variance with Pestalozzian principles.— Education, Chap. ii. 



262 THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 

those of Tenniel and Harrison Weir. But, it seems well 
understood that these gentlemen are incapable of doing 
anything for children beyond affording them innocent 
amusement, and we should be as much surprised at see- 
ing their works introduced into that region of asceti- 
cism, the English school-room, as if we ran across one 
of Raphael's Madonnas in a Baptist chapel. 

I had the good fortune, some years ago, to be present 
at the lessens given by a very excellent teacher to the 
youngest class, consisting both of boys and girls, at the 
first Bwger-hchule of Leipzig. In Saxony the schooling 
which the state demands for each child, begins at six 
years old, and lasts till fourteen. These children were, 
therefore, between six and seven. In one year, a certain 
Dr. Yater taught them to read, write, and reckon. His 
method was as follows: — Each child had a book with 
pictures of objects, such as a hat, a slate, etc. Under 
the picture was the name of the object in printing and 
writing characters, and also a couplet about the object. 
The children having opened their books, and found the 
picture of a hat, the teacher showed them a hat, and 
told them a tale connected with one. He then asked 
the children questions about his story, and about the hat 
he had in his hand — What was the color of it? etc. 
He then drew a hat on the blackboard, and made the 
children copy it on their slates. Next he wrote the 
word "hat," and told them that for people who could 
read this did as well as the picture. The children then 
copied the word on their slates. The teacher proceded 
to analyze the word " hat." " It is made up," said he, 
" of three sounds, the most important of which is the «, 
which comes in the middle." In all cases the vowel 



A BURGER-SCHULE AT LEIPZIG. 263 

sound was first ascertained in every syllable, and then 
was given an approximation to the consonantal sounds 
before and after. The couplet was now read by the 
teacher, and the children repeated it after him. In this 
way the book had to be worked over and over till the 
children were perfectly familiar Avith everything in it. 
They had been already six months thus employed when 
I visited the school, and knew the book pretty thorough- 
ly. To test their knowledge, Dr. Vater first wrote a 
number of capitals at random, on the board, and called 
out a boy to tell him words having these capitals as 
initials. This boy had to call out a girl to do some- 
thing of the kind, she a boy, and so forth. Everything 
was done very smartly, both by master and children. 
The best proof I saw of their accuracy and quickness 
was this: the master traced words from the book very 
rapidly with a stick on the blackboard, and the children 
always called out the right word, though I often could 
not follow him. He also wrote with chalk words which 
the children had never seen, and made them name first 
the vowel sounds, then the consonantal, then combine 
them. 

I have been thus minute in my description of this les- 
son, because it seems to me an admirable example of 
the way in which children between six and eight years 
of age should be taught. The method was arranged 
and the book prepared by the late Dr. Vogel, Avho was 
then Director of the school. Its merits, as its author 
pointed out to me, are: — 1. That it connects the instruc- 
tion with objects of which the child has already an idea 
in his mind, and so associates new knowledge with old; 
2. That it gives the children plenty to do as well as to 



264 THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 

learn, a point on which the Doctor was very emphatic; 
3. That it makes the children go over the same matter 
in various ways, till they have learnt a little thoroughly, and 
then applies their knowledge to the acquirement of more. 
Here the Doctor seems to have followed Jacotot. But 
though the method was no doubt a good one, I must say 
its success at Leipzig was due at least as much to Dr. 
Vater as to Dr. Yogel. This gentleman had been tak- 
ing the youngest class in this school for twenty years, 
and, whether by practice or natural talent, he had ac- 
quired precisely the right manner for keeping children's 
attention. He was energetic without bustle and excite- 
ment, and quiet without a suspicion of dullness or 
apathy. By frequently changing the employment of the 
class, and requiring smartness in everything that was 
done, he kept them all on the alert. The lesson I have 
described was followed without pause by one in arith- 
metic, the two together occupying an hour and three- 
quarters, and the interest of the children never flagged 
throughout. 

It is then possible to teach children, at this stage at 
least, without making them hate their work, and dread 
the sound of the school-bell. 

I will suppose a child to have passed through such a 
course as this by the time he is eight or nine years old. 
He can now read and copy easy words. What we next 
want for him is a series of good reading books, about 
things in which he takes an interest. The language 
must of course be simple, but the matter so good that 
neither master nor pupils will be disgusted by its fre- 
quent repetition. 

The first volume may very well be about animals — 



ATTRACTIVE TEXT-BOOKS. 265 

dogs, horses, etc., of which large pictures should be pro- 
vided, illustrating the text. The first cost of these pic- 
tures would be considerable, but as they would last for 
years, the expense to the friends of each child taught 
from them, would be a mere trifle. 

The books placed in the hands of the children, 
should be well printed, and strongly bound. In the 
present penny-wise system, school-books are given out 
in cloth, and the leaves are loose at the end of a fort- 
night, so that children get accustomed to their destruc- 
tion, and treat it as a matter of course. This ruins their 
respect for books, which is not so unimportant a matter 
as it may at first appear. 

After each reading lesson, which should contain at 
least one interesting anecdote, there should be columns 
of all the words which occurred for the first time in that 
lesson. These should be arranged according to their 
grammatical classification, not that the child should be 
taught grammar, but this order is as good as any other, 
and by it the child would learn to observe certain differ- 
ences in words almost unconsciously. As good reading 
is best learnt by imitation, the lesson should first be read 
aloud by the master. It will sometimes be a useful exer- 
<;ise to make the children prepare a lesson beforehand^ 
and give an account of the substance of it before open- 
ing their books, ^'Accustoming boys to read aloud what 
they do not first understand," says Dr. Franklin, "is the 
<}ause of those even set tones so common among readers, 
which, when they have once got a habit of using, they 
find so difficult to correct; by which means, among fifty 
readers we scarcely find a good one."* 

* Essays : Sketch of an English School. 



Il 



266 THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 

As a chaDge reading-book, ^sop's Fables raay now 
be used, and an edition with such illustrations as Ten- 
niel's will be well worth the additional outlay. 

Easy descriptive and narrative poetry should be 
learnt by heart in this form. That the children may 
repeat it well, they should get their first notions of it 
from the master viva voce [orally]. According to the 
usual plan, they get it up with false emphasis and false 
stops, and the more thoroughly they have learnt the 
piece, the more difficulty the master has in making them 
say it properly. 

Every lesson should be worked over in various ways. 
The columns of words at the end of the reading lessons 
may be printed with writing characters, and used for 
copies. To write an upright column either of words or 
figures is an excellent exercise in neatness. The columns 
will also be used as spelling lessons, and the children 
may be questioned about the meaning of the words. 
The poetry, when thoroughly learned, may sometimes be 
written from memory. Sentences from the book may be 
copied either directly or from the blackboard, and after- 
ward used for dictation. 

Dictation lessons are often given very badly. The 
boys spell nearly as many words wrong as right, and if 
even all the blunders are corrected, little more pains is 
taken to impress the right way on their memory than 
the wrong. But the chief use of dictation is to fix in 
the memory by practice words already known. Another 
mistake is for the master to keep repeating the sentence 
the boys are writing. He should first read the piece 
straight through, that the boys may know what they 
are writing about. Then he should read it by clauses^ 



COMPOSITION WORK. 267 

slowly aDd distinctly, waiting a sufficient time between 
the clauses, but never repeating them. This exercises 
the boys' attention, and accustoms their ear to the form 
of good sentences — an excellent preparation for compo- 
sition. Where the dictation lesson has been given from 
the reading-book, the boys may afterward take the book 
and correct either their own exercises or one another's.* 
Boys should as soon as possible be accustomed to write 
out fables, or the substance of other reading lessons, in 
their own words. They may also write descriptions of 
things with which they are familiar, or any event which 
has recently happened, such as a country excursion. 
Every one feels the necessity, on grounds of practical 
utility at all events, of boys being taught to express 
their thoughts neatly on paper, in good English and with 
correct spelling. Yet this is a point rarely reached before 
the age of fifteen or sixteen, often never reached at all. 
The reason is, that written exercises must be carefully 
looked over by the master, or they are done in a slovenly 
manner. Any one who has never taught in a school will 
say, " Then let the master carefully look them over." 
But the expenditure of time and trouble this involves on 
the master is so great that in the end he is pretty sure 
either to have few exercises written, or to neglect to 
look them over. The only remedy is for the master not 



*Mr. R. Robinson, In his Manual of Method and Organization, gives 
some good hints for impressing on boys' memories the words they have 
spelt wrong. An exercise-book, he says, shonld always be used for the 
dictation lesson, and of every word in which a boy blunders, he should 
afterward make a line at the end of the book, writing the word as many- 
times as it will go in the liae. Now and then the master may turn to these 
words, and examine the boy in them, and by comparing different books,, 
he will see which words are most likely to be wrongly spelt. 



268 THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 

to have many boys to teach, and not to be many hours 
in school. Even then, unless he set apart a special time 
every day for correcting exercises, he is likely to find 
them "increase upon him." 

The course of reading-books, accompanied by large 
illustrations, may go on to many other things which the 
children see around them, such as trees and plants, and 
so lead up to instruction in natural history and physiol- 
ogy. But in imparting all knowledge of this kind, we 
should aim, not at getting the children to remember a 
number of facts, but at opening their eyes, and extending 
the range of their interests. 

Hitherto I have supposed the children to have only 
three books at the same time; viz., a reading-book about 
animals and things, a poetry book, and ^sop's Fables. 
With the first commences a series culminating in works 
of science; with the second a series that should lead up 
to Milton and Shakespeare; the third should be suc- 
ceeded by some of our best writers in prose. 

But many schoolmasters will shudder at the thought 
of a child's spending a year or two at school without 
ever hearing of the Heptarchy or Magna Charta, and 
•without knowing the names of the great towns in any 
country of Europe. I confess I regard this ignorance 
with great equanimity. If the child, or the youth even, 
takes no interest in the Heptarchy and Magna Charta, 
and knows nothing of the towns but their names, I think 
him quite as well off without this knowledge as with it 
— perhaps better, as such knov/ledge turns the lad into 
a " wind-bag," as Carlyle might say, and gives him the 
appearance of being well-informed without the reality. 
But I neither despise a knowledge of history and geog- 



LEARNING THE INDEX. 269 

raphy, nor do I think that these studies should be neg- 
lected for foreign languages or science; and it is because 
I should wish a pupil of mine to become in the end thor- 
oughly conversant in history and geography, that I 
should, if possible, conceal from him the existence of the 
numerous school manuals on these subjects. 

We will suppose that a parent meets with a book 
which he thinks will be both instructive and entertaining 
to his children. But the book is a large one, and would 
take a long time to get through; so, instead of reading 
any part of it to them or letting them read it for them- 
selves, he makes them learn the index hy heart. The chil- 
dren do not find it entertaining; they get a horror of the 
book, which prevents their ever looking at it afterward, 
and they forget the index as soon as they possibly can. 
Just such is the sagacious plan adopted in teaching his- 
tory and geography in schools, and such are the natural 
consequences. Every student knows that the use of an 
epitome is to «y«^6'm<?/!/s6 knowledge, not to communicate it, 
and yet, in teaching, we give the epitome first, and al- 
low it to precede, or rather to supplant, the knowledge 
epitomized. The children are disgusted, and no wonder. 
The subjects, indeed, are interesting, but not so the 
epitomes. I suppose if we could see the skeletons of the 
Gunnings, we should not find them more fascinating 
than any other skeletons. 

The first thing to be aimed at, then, is to excite the 
children's interest. Even if we thought of nothing but 
the acquiring of information, this is clearly the true 
method. What are the facts which we remember ? 
Those in which we feel an interest. If we are told that 
So-and-so has met with an accident, or failed in business. 



210 THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 

we forget it directly, unless we know the person spoken 
of. Similarly, if I read anything about Addison or Gold- 
smith, it interests me, and I remember it, because they 
are, so to speak, friends of mine; but the same informa- 
tion about Sir Richard Blackmore or Cumberland would 
not stay in my head for four-and-twenty hours. So, 
again, we naturally retain anything we learn about a 
foreign country in which a relation has settled, but it 
would require some little trouble to commit to memory 
the same facts about a place in which we had no con- 
cern. Ail this proceeds from two causes. First, that 
the mind retains that in which it takes an interest, and, 
secondly, that one of the principal helps to memory is the 
association of ideas. These were, no doubt, the ground 
reasons which influenced Dr. Arnold in framing his plan 
of a child's first history-book. This book, he says, should 
be a picture book of the memorable deeds which would 
best appeal to the child's imagination. They should be 
arranged in order of time, but with no other connection. 
T^e letterpress should simply, but fully, tell the stor^ of 
the action depicted. These would form starting-points 
of interest. The child would be carious to know more 
about the great men whose acquaintance he had made, 
and would associate with them the scenes of their ex- 
ploits; and thus we might actually find our children 
anxious to learn history and geography! I am sorry that 
even the great authority of Dr. Arnold has not availed 
to bring this method into use. Such a book would, of 
course, be dear. Bad pictures are worse than none at 
all: and Goethe tells us that his appreciation of Homer 
was for years destroyed by his having been shown, when 
a child, absurd pictures (Fratzmhildsr) of the Homeric 



ILLUSTRATED TEXT-BOOKS 271 

heroes. The book would, therefore, cost six or eight 
shillings at least; and who would give this sum for an 
account of single actions of a few great men, when he 
might buy the lives of all great men, together with an- 
cient and modern history, the names of the planets, and 
a great amount of miscellaneous information, all for half- 
a-crown in " Mangall's Questions ? " 

However, if the saving of a few shillings is more to be 
thought of than the best method of instruction, the sub- 
ject hardly deserves our serious consideration. 

It is much to be regretted that books for the young 
are so seldom written by distinguished authors. I sup- 
pose that of the tiiree things which the author seeks — 
money, reputation, influence — the first is not often de- 
spised, nor the last considered the least valuable. And 
yet both money and influence are more certainly gained 
by a good book for the young, than by any other. The 
influence of "Tom Brown," however different in kind, 
is probably not smaller in amount, than that of " Sartor 
Resartus." . : 

An ioQprovement, I hope, has already begun. Miss 
Yonge's "Golden Deeds "is just the sort of a book 
that I have been recommending. Professor Huxley has 
lately published an elementary book on Physiology, and 
Professor Kingsley has promised us a " Boys' History of 
England." 

What we want is a Macaulay for boys, who shall han- 
dle historical subjects with that wonderful art displayed 
in the "Essays" — the art of elaborating all the more 
telling portions of the subject, outlining the rest, and 
suppressing everything that does not conduce to height- 
en the general effect. Some of these essays, such as the 



272 THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 

" Hastings " and " Clive," will be read with avidity by 
the elder boys; but as Macaulay did not write for chil- 
dren, he abounds in words to thern unintelligible. Had 
he been a married man, we might perhaps have had such 
a volume of historical sketches for boys as now we 
must wish for in vain. But there are good story-tellers 
left among us, and we might soon expect such books as 
we desiderate, if it were clearly understood what is the 
right sort of book, and if men of literary ability and 
experience would condescend to write them. At present, 
teachers who have a " connection " make compendiums, 
which last only as long as the " connection " that floats 
them: and literary men, if they wish to make money 
out of the young, hand over works written for adults, to 
some underling, who epitomizes them for schools. Of 
Mr. Knight, who has done so much for sound education, 
I should have expected better things; but he tells us in 
a volume of some 500 pages, called " Knight's School 
History of England," condensed from his large history 
under his superintendence^ that he trusts no event of impor- 
tance in our annals has been omitted. This seems to me 
like trusting that the work is valueless for all purposes 
of rational instruction. 

If in these latter days "the individual withers, and 
the world is more and more," we must not expect our 
children to enter into this. Their sympathy and their 
imagination can be aroused, not for nations, but for 
individuals; and this is the reason why some biogra- 
phies of great men should precede any history. These 
should be written after Macaulay's method. There 
should be no attempt at completeness, but what is most 
important and interesting about the man should be nar- 



HISTORY-TEACHING. 273 

rated in detail, and the rest lightly sketched, or omitted 
altogether. Painters understand this principle, and in 
taking a portrait, very often depict a man's features 
minutely without telling all the truth about the buttons 
on his waistcoat. But, because in a literary picture each 
touch takes up additional space, writers seem to fear 
that the picture will be distorted unless every particular 
is expanded or condensed in the same ratio. As a model 
for our biographies, we may take " Plutarch's Lives," 
which should be read as soon as boys are old enough to 
like them.* 

At the risk of wearisome repetition, I must again say, 
that I care as little about driving *' useful knowledge " 
into a boy, as the most ultra Cambridge- man could wish; 
but I want to get the boy to have wide sympathies, and 
to teach himself; and I should therefore select the great 
men from very different periods and countries, that his 
net of interest (if I am allowed the metaphor) may be 
spread in all waters. 

When we have thus got our boys to form the acquain- 
tance of great men, they will have certain associations 
connected with many towns and countries. Constant 
reference should be made to the map, and the boy's 

♦"There is no profane study better than Plutarch: all other learning 
is private, fitter for universities than cities; fuller of contemplation than 
experience; more commendable in students themselves than profitable 
unto others. Whereas stories are fit for every place, reach to all persons^ 
serve for all times; teach the living, revive the dead; so far excelling all 
other books, as it is better to see learning in noble men's lives than to 
read it in philosopher's writings. Now for the author ... I believe I 
might be bold to affirm that he hath written the profitablest story of all 
authors ; . . . being excellent in wit, learning, and experience, he hath 
chosen the special acts of the best persons of the famousest nations of 
the world."— Sir Thomas North's Dedication to Queen Elizabeth of his 
translation of Plutarch. 
Q 



2*74 THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 

knowledge and interest will thus make settlements in 
different parts of the globe. These may be extended 
by a good book of travels, especially of voyages of 
discovery. There are, no doubt, many such books 
suitable for the purpose, but the only one I have met 
with is Miss Hack's " Winter Evenings ; or Tales 
of Travelers," which has been a great favorite with 
children for the last five-and-twenty years at least. 
This is a capital book, but the very childish conversa- 
tions interpolated in the narratives would disgust a boy 
a little too old for them, much more than they would an 
adult reader. In studying such travels, the map should, 
of course, be always in sight; and outline maps may be 
filled up by the boys, as they learn about the places in 
the traveler's route. Any one who has had the manage- 
ment of a school library knows how popular *' voyage 
and venture" is with the boys who have passed the 
stage in which the picture-books of animals were the 
main attraction. Captain Cook, Mungo Park, and 
Admiral Byron are heroes without whom boyhood 
would be incomplete; but as boys are engrossed by the 
adventures and never trouble themselves about the map, 
they often remember the incidents without knowing 
where they happened. 

Of course school geographies never mention such peo- 
ple as celebrated travelers: if they did, it would be im- 
possible to give all the principal geographical names in 
the world within the compass of two hundred pages. 

What might be fairly expected from such a course of 
teaching as I have here suggested ? 

At the end of a year and a half or two years from the 
age, say, of nine, the boy would read aloud well, he 



EESULTS OF IMPROVED TEACHING. 275 

would write fairly, he would spell all common English 
words correctly; he would have had his interest ex- 
cited or increased in common objects, such as animals, 
trees, and plants; he would have made the acquaintance 
of some great men, and traced the voyages of some 
great travelers; he would be able to say by heart some 
of the best simple English poetry, and his ear would be 
familiar with the sound of good English prose. Above 
all, he would not have learned to look upon books and 
school-time as the torment of his life, nor have fallen 
into the habit of giving them as little of his attention 
as he could reconcile with immunity from the cane. 
The benefit of this negative result, at all events, might 
prove incalculable. 



XII. 
MORAL AND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. 

All who are acquainted with the standard treatises on 
the theory of education, and also with the management 
of schools, will have observed that moral and religious 
training occupies a larger and more prominent space in 
theory than in practice. On consideration, we shall find 
perhaps that this might naturally be expected. Of 
course we are all agreed that morality is more important 
than learning, and masters, who are many of them cler- 
gymen, will hardly be accused of underestimating the 
value of religion. Why, then, does not moral and 
religious training receive a larger share of the master's 
attention ? The reason I take to be this. Experience 
shows that it depends directly on the master whether a 
boy acquires knowledge, but only indirectly, and in a 
much less degree, whether he grows up a good and 
religious man. The aim which engrosses most of our 
time is likely to absorb an equal share of our interest; 
and thus it happens that masters, especially those who 
never associate on terms of intimacy with their pupils 
out of school, throw energy enough into making boys 
lea/rn, but seldom think at all of the development of their 
character, or about their thoughts and feelings in mat- 
ters of religion. This statement may indeed be exagger- 
ated, but no one who has the means of judging will 



UNCONSCIOUS TUITION. 277 

assert that it is altogether without foundation. And 
yet, although a master can be more certain of sending 
out his pupils well taught than well principled, his influ- 
ence on their character is much greater than it might 
appear to a superficial observer. I intend speaking 
presently of formal religious instruction. I refer now 
to the teacher's indirect influence. The results of his 
formal teaching vary as its amount, but he can apply no 
such gauge to his informal teaching. A few words of 
earnest advice or remonstrance, which a boy hears at the 
right time from a man whom he respects, may affect that 
boy's character for life. Here everything depends, not 
on the words used, but on the feeling with which they 
are spoken, and on the way in which the speaker is re- 
garded by the hearer. In such matters the master has 
a much more delicate and difficult task than in mere in- 
struction. The words, indeed, are soon spoken, but that 
which gives them their influence is not soon or easily 
acquired. Here, as in so many other instances, we may 
in a few minutes throw down what it has cost us days — 
perhaps years — to build up. An unkind word will de- 
stroy the effects of long-continued kindness. Boys 
always form their opinion of a man from the worst they 
know of him. Experience has not yet taught them that 
good people have their failings, and bad people their 
virtues. If the scholars find the master at times harsh 
and testy, they can not believe in his kindness of heart 
and care for their welfare. They do not see that he 
may have an ideal before him to which he is partly, 
though not wholly, true. They judge him by his de- 
meanor in his least guarded moments — at times when he 
is jaded and dissatisfied with the results of his labors. 



278 MORAL AND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. 

At such times the bonds of sympathy between him and 
his pupils hang loose. He is conscions only of his power 
and of his mental superiority. Feeling almost a con- 
tempt for the boys' weakness, he does not care for their 
opinion of him, or think for an instant what impression 
he is making by his words and conduct. He gives full 
play to his arhiirinm, and says or does something which 
seems to the boys to reveal him in his true character, 
and which causes them ever after to distrust his kind- 
ness. 

When we consider the way in which masters endeavor 
to gain influence, we shall find that they may be divided 
roughly into two parties, whom I will call, as a matter 
of convenience, realists and idealists. A teacher of the 
real party endeavors to appear to his pupils precisely as 
he is. He will hear of no restraint except that of de- 
corum. He believes that if he is as much the superior 
of his pupils as he ought to be, his authority will take 
care of itself, without his casting round it a wall of arti- 
ficial reserve. "Be natural," he says; "get rid of 
affectations and shams of all kinds; and then, if there is 
any good in you, it will tell on those around you. 
Whatever is bad, would be felt just as surely in dis- 
guise; and tbe disguise would only be an additional 
source of mischief." The idealists, on the other hand, 
wish their pupils to think of them as they ought to be, 
rather than as they are. They urge against the realists 
that our words and actions can not always be in har- 
mony with our thoughts and feelings, however much we 
may desire to make them so. We must, therefore, they 
say, reconcile ourselves to this fact; and since our words 
and actions are more under our control than our 



KEALISTS AND IDEALISTS. 2V9 

thoughts and feelings, we must make them as nearly as 
possible what they should be, instead of debasing them 
to involuntary thoughts and feelings which are not 
worthy of us. Then, again, the idealist teacher may say, 
" The young require some one to look up to. In my 
better moments I am not altogether unworthy of. their 
respect, but if they knew all my weaknesses, they would 
naturally, and perhaps justly, despise me. For their 
sakes, therefore, I must keep my weaknesses out of 
sight, and the effort to do this demands a certain reserve 
in all our intercourse." 

I suppose an excess of either realism or idealism 
might lead to mischievous results. The " real " man 
might be wanting in self-restraint, and might say and 
do things which, though not wrong in themselves, might 
have a bad effect on the young. Then, again, the lower 
and more worldly side of his character might show itself 
in too strong relief, and his pupils seeing this mainly, 
and supposing that they understood him entirely, might 
disbelieve in his higher motives and religious feeling. 
On the other hand, the idealists are, as it were, walking 
on stilts. They gain no real influence by their separa- 
tion from their pupils, and they are always liable to an 
accident which may expose them to their ridicule. 

I am, therefore, though with some limitation, in favor 
of the natural school. I am well aware, however what 
an immense demand this system makes on the master 
who desires to exercise a good influence on the moral 
and religious character of his pupils. If he would have 
his pupils know him as he is, if he would have them 
think as he thinks, feel as he feels, and believe as he be- 
lieves, he must be, at least in heart and aim,worthy of their 



280 MORAL AND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. 

imitation. He must (with reverence be it spoken) enter, 
in his humble way, into the spirit of the perfect Teacher, 
who said, " For their sakes I sanctify myself, that they 
also may be sanctified in truth." Are we prepared to 
look upon our calling in this light ? I believe that the 
school-teachers of this country need not fear comparison 
with any other body of men, in point of morality and 
religious earnestness; but I dare say many have found, 
as I have, that the occupation is a very narrowing one, 
that the teacher soon gets to work in a groove, and 
from having his thoughts so much occupied with routine 
work, especially with small fault findings and small cor- 
rections, he is apt to settle down insensibly into a kind 
of moral and intellectual stagnation — Philistinism, as 
Mr. Matthew Arnold would call it — in which he cares as 
little for high aims and general principles as his most 
commonplace pupil. Thus it happens sometimes that a 
man who set out with the notion of developing all the 
powers of his pupils' minds, thinks in the end of nothing 
but getting them to work oat equations and do Latin 
exercises without false concords; and the clergyman 
even who began with a strong sense of his responsi- 
bility, and a confident hope of influencing the boys' be- 
lief and character at length is quite content if they con- 
form to discipline, and give him no trouble out of 
school-hours. We may say of a really good teacher 
what Wordsworth says of the poet; in his work he must 
neither 

lack that first great gift, the vital soul, 
Nor general truths, which are themselves a sort 
Of elements and agents, underpowers, 
Subordinate helpers of the human mind.— Pre/wde, i. 9. 

But the " vital soul " is too often crushed by excessive 



FORMAL TEACHING. 281 

routine labor, and then when general truths, both moral 
and intellectual, have ceased to interest us, our own ed- 
ucation stops, and we become incapable of fulfilling the 
highest and most important part of our duty in educat- 
ing others. 

It is, then, the duty of the teacher to resist gravitat- 
ing into this state, no less for his pupils' sake than for 
his own. The ways and means of doing this I am by no 
means competent to point out; so I will merely insist on 
the importance of teachers not being overworked — a 
matter which has not, I think, hitherto, received due at- 
tention. 

We can not expect intellectual activity of men whose 
minds are compelled "with pack-horse constancy to keep 
the road " hour after hour, till they are too jaded for ex- 
ertion of any kind. The man himself suffers, and his 
work, even his easiest work, suffers also. It may be laid 
down, as a general rule, that no one can teach long and 
teach well. All satisfactory teaching and management 
of boys absolutely require that the master should be in 
good spirits. When the " genial spirits fail," as they must 
from an overdose of monotonous work, everything goes 
wrong directly. The master has no longer the power of 
keeping the boys' attention, and has to resort to punish- 
ments even to preserve order. His gloom quenches 
their interest and mental activity, just as fire goes out 
before carbonic acid; and in the end teacher and taught 
acquire, not without cause, a feeliiig of mutual aver- 
sion. 

And another reason why the master should not spend 
the greater part of his time in formal teaching is this — 
his doing so compels him to neglect the informal but 



282 MORAL AND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION". 

very important teaching he may both give and receive 
by making his pupils his companions. 

I fear I shall be met here by an objection which has 
only too much force in it. Most Englishmen are at a 
loss how to make any use of leisure. If a man has no turn 
for thinking, no fondness for reading, and is without a 
hobby, what good shall his leisure do him? He will 
only pass it in insipid gossip, from which any easy work 
would be a relief. That this is so, in many cases, is a 
proof, to my mind, of the utter failure of our ordinary 
education; and perhaps an improved education may 
some day alter what now seems a national peculiarity. 
Meantime the mind, even of Englishmen, is more than a 
" succedaneum for salt,"* and its tendency to bury its 
sight ostrich-fashion, under a heap of routine work, must 
be strenuously resisted, if it is to escape its deadly ene- 
mies, stupidity and ignorance. 

I have elsewhere expressed what I believe is the com- 
mon conviction of those who have seen something both 
of large schools and of small, viz., that the moral atmo- 
sphere of the former is, as a rule, by far the more whole- 
some;! and also that each boy is more influenced by his 

* " That you are wife 

To so much bloated flesh, as scarce hath soul 
Instead of salt to keep it sweet, I think 
Will ask no witness to prove." 

Ben Jonson : The Devil is an Ass, Act i,, sc. 3. 

I I have quoted De Quincy on this subject {supra, p. 85, note). Here is 
the testimony of a schoolmaster to the same effect. Mr. Hope, in his 
amusing '* Book about Dominies," says, that a school of from twenty to a 
hundred boys is too large to be altogether under the influence of one man, 
and too small for the development of a healthy condition of public opinion 
among the boys themselves. "In a community of fifty boys.there will always 
be found so many bad ones who will be likely to carry things their own 
way. Vice is more unblushing in small societies than in large ones. Fifti/ 



MUTUAL INFLUENCE OF PUPILS. 28S 

companions than by his master. More than this, I be- 
lieve that in many, perhaps in most, schools, one or two 
boys affect the tone of the whole body more than the 
master.* What are called Preparatory Schools labor 
under this immense disadvantage, that their ruling 
spirits are mere children without reflection or sense of 
responsibility. But where the leading boys are virtu- 
ally young men, these may be made a medium through 
which the mind of the master may act upon the whole 
school. They can enter into the thoughts, feelings, and 
aims of the master on the one hand, and they know what 
is said and done among the boys on the other. The 
master must, therefore, know the elder boys intimately,, 
and they must know him. This consummation, how- 
ever, will not be arrived at without great tact and self- 
denial on the part of the master. The youth, who is 
" neither man nor boy," is apt to be shy and awkward, 
and is not by any means so easy to entertain as the lad 
who chatters freely of the school's cricket or foot-ball> 
past, present, and to come. But the master who feels 

boys will be mure easily leavened ly the uicicdne^s of five Jhan five hun- 
dred by that of fifty. It would be too dangerous an ordeal to send a boy 
to a school where sin appears fashionable, and where, if he would remain 
virtuous, he must shun his companions. There may be middle-sized 
schools which derive a good and healthy tone from the moral strength of 
their masters, or the good example of a certain set of boys, but I doubt 
if there are many. Boys are so easily led to do right or wrong, that w-e 
should be very careful at least to set the balance fairly " (p. 167) ; and 
again he says (p. 170), "The moral tone of a middle-sized school will be- 
peculiarly liable to be at the mercy of a set of bold and bad boys." 

* " The moral tone of the school is made what it is, not nearly so much 
by its rules and regulations or its masters, as by the leading characters 
among the boys. They mainly determine the public opinion amongst 
their schoolfellows— their personal influence is incalculable." I quote 
these words of a master whose opinion is respected by all who know him, 
because I have been thought to express myself so strongly on this point. 



284 MORAL A.ND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. 

how all-important is the tone of the school, will not 
grudge any pains to influence those on whom it chiefly j 
depends. 

But, allowing the value of all these indirect influences, 
can we afford to neglect direct formal religious instruc- 
tion ? We have most of us the greatest horror of what 
we call a secular education, meaning thereby an educa- 
tion without formal religious teaching. But this horror 
seems to affect our theory more than our practice. Few 
parents ever inquire what religious instruction their sons 
get at Eton, Harrow, or Westminster. 1 am told that, 
in amount at least, it is quite insignificant; and I can 
myself vouch for the fact, that once upon a time the 
lower forms at one of these had no religious instruction 
except a weekly lesson in Watts' " Scripture History." 
Even in some national schools, where the managers would 
rather close their doors altogether than accept the "Con- 
science-clause," the religious instruction is confined to 
teaching the Catechism by heart, and using the Bible as 
a reading-book. 

In this matter we differ very widely from the Ger- 
mans. All their classes have a " religion-lesson " {Re- 
ligionstunde) nearly every day, the younger children in 
the German Bible, the elder in the Greek Testament or 
Church History ; and in all cases the teacher is careful 
to instruct his pupils in the tenets of Luther or Calvin. 
The Germans may urge that if we believe a set of doc- 
trines to be a fitting expression of Divine revelation, it 
is our first duty to make the young familiar with those 
doctrines. I can not say, however, that I have been 
favorably impressed by the religion-lessons I have heard 
given in German schools. I do not deny that dogmatic 



RELIGIOUS INSTKUCTION. 285 

teaching is necessary, but the first thing to cultivate in 
the young is reverence; and reverence is surely in dan- 
ger if you take a class in " religion " just as you take a 
class in grammar. Emerson says somewhere, that to 
the poet, the saint, and the philosopher, all dis- 
tinction of sacred and profane ceases to exist, all 
things become alike sacred. As the schoolboy, however, 
does not as yet come under any one of these denomina- 
tions, if the distinction ceases to exist for him, all things 
will become alike profane. 

I believe that religious instruction is conveyed in the 
most impressive way when it is connected with worship. 
Where the prayers are joined with the reading of Scrip- 
ture, and with occasional simple addresses, and where the 
congregation have responses to repeat, and psalms and 
hymns to sing, there is reason to hope that boys will in- 
crease, not only in knowledge, but in wisdom and rever- 
ence too. Without asserting that the Church of Eng- 
land service is the best possible for the young, I hold 
that any forna for them should at least resemble it in its 
main features, should be as varied as possible, should re- 
quire frequent change of posture, and should give the 
congregation much to say and sing. The Church of 
Rome is wise, I think, in making more use than we do 
of litanies. The service, whatever its form, should be 
conducted with great solemnity, and the boys should 
not sit or kneel so close together that the badly disposed 
may disturb their neighbors who try to join in the act of 
worship. If good hymns are sung, these may be taken 
occasionally as the subject of an address, so that atten- 
tion may be drawn to their meaning. Music should be 
carefully attended to, and the danger of irreverence at 



.286 MORAL AND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. 

practice guarded against by never using sacred words 
more than is necessary, and by impressing on tbe sing- 
ers the sacredness of everything connected with Divine 
worship. Questions combined with instruction may 
sometimes keep up boys' attention better than a formal 
sermon. Though common prayer should be frequent, 
this should not be supposed to take the place of private 
prayer. In many schools boys have hardly an opportu- 
nity for private prayer. They kneel down, perhaps, 
with all the talk and play of their schoolfellows going 
on around them, and sometimes fear of public opinion 
prevents their kneeling down at all. A schoolmaster 
can not teach private prayer, but he can at least see 
that there is opportunity for it. 

These observations of mine only touch the surface of 
this most important subject, and do not point the way 
to any efficient religious education. lu fact, I believe 
that education to piety, as far as it lies in human hands, 
must consist almost entirely in the influence of the pious 
superior over his inferiors.* 

In conclusion, I wish to say a word on the education 
of opinion. Helps lays great stress on preparing the 
way to moderation and opea-mindedness, by teaching 
boys that all good men are not of the same way of 
thinking. It is indeed a miserable error to lead a young 
person to suppose that his small ideas are a measure of 



*" What is education? It is that which is imbibed from the moral 
atmosphere which a child breathes. It is the involuntary and unconscious 
language of its parents and of all those by whom it is surrounded, and not 
their set speeches and set lectures. It is the words which the young hear 
fall from their seniors when the speakers are off their guard: and it is by 
these unconscious expressions that the child interprets the hearts of its 
parents. That is education."—'* Drummond's Speeches in Parliament." 



THE EDUCATION OF OPINION. 287 

the universe, and that all who do not accept his formu- 
laries are less enlightened than himself. If a young 
man is so brought up, he either carries intellectual 
blinkers all his life, or, what is far more probable, he 
finds that something he has been taught is false, and 
forthwith begins to doubt everything. On the other 
hand, it is a necessity with the young to believe, and we 
could not, even if we would, bring a ycaith into such a 
state of mind as to regard everything about which there 
is any variety of opinion as an open question. But he 
may be taught reverence and humility; he may be 
taught to reflect how infinitely greater the facts of the 
universe must be than our poor thoughts about them, 
and how inadequate are words to express even our im- 
perfect thoughts. Then he will not suppose that all 
truth has been taught him in his formularies, nor that 
he understands even all the truth of which those formu- 
laries are the imperfect expression.* 

' * In what I have said on this subject, the Incompleteness which is 
noticeable enough in the preceding essays, has found an appropriate cli- 
max. I see, too, that if any one would take the trouble, the little I have 
said might easily be misinterpreted. I am well aware, however, that if the 
young mind will not readily assimilate sharply defining religious formulae 
still less will it feel at home among the " immensities " and " veracities." 
The great educating force of Christianity I believe to be due to this, that 
it is not a set of abstractions or vague generalities, but that in it God re- 
veals himself to us in a Divine Man, and raises us through our devotion to 
Him. I hold therefore that religious teaching for the young should neither 
be vague nor abstract. Mr. Froude, in commenting on the use made of 
hagiology in the Church of Rome, has shown that we lose much by not fol- 
lowing the Bible method of instruction. (See " Short Studies : Lives of 
the Saints and Representative Men.") 



APPENDIX 



CLASS MATCHES. 

With young classes I have tried the Jesuits' plan of 
matches [see page 23], and have found it answer exceed- 
ingly well. The top boy and the second pick up sides 
(in schoolboy phrase), the second boy having first choice. 
The same sides may be kept till the superiority of one 
of them is clearly established, when it becomes necessary 
to pick up again. The matches, if not too frequent, 
prove an excellent break to the monotony of school- 
work. A subject well suited for them (as Franklin 
pointed out) is spelling. The boys are told that on a 
certain day there will be a match in the spelling of 
some certain class of words — say words of one syllable, 
or the preterites of verbs. For the match the sides are 
arranged in lines opposite one another; the dux of one 
side questions the dux of the other, the second boy the 
second, and so forth. The match may be conducted 
viva voce, or, better still, by papers previously written. 
Each boy has to bring on paper a list of the right sort of 
words. Suppose six is the number required, he will 
write a column with a few to spare, as some of his 
words may be disallowed by the umpire, i. e., the master. 
The master takes the first boy's list, and asks the top 
boy on the opposite side to spell the words. When he 



ALEXANDER DE VILLA DEI. 289 

fails, the owner of the list has to correct him, and gets a 
mark for doing so. Should the owner of the list him- 
self make a mistake, his opponent scores even if he is 
wrong also. When the master has gone through all the 
lists in this way, he adds up the marks, and announces 
which side has won. The method has the great merit of 
stimulating the lower end of the form as well as the top; 
for it usually happens that the match is really decided 
by the lower boys, who make the most mistakes. Of 
course the details and the subjects of such matches ad- 
mit of almost endless variation. 



DOCTRINALE ALEXANDRI DE VILLA DEL 

This celebrated grammar [see page 35] was written by 

a Franciscan of Brittany, about the middle of the 

thirteenth century. It is in leonine verses. To the 

verses is attached a commentary, which is by no means 

superfluous. The book begins thus: 

Scribere clericulis paro Doctrinale novellis, 
Pluraque doctorum soclabo scripta meorum. 
Jaraque legent pueri pro nugis Maximiani 
Quae veteres sociis nolebant pandere caris. 

(Maximianus, says the commentary, was a scriptor fah- 

ularum.) 

Presens huic operi sit gratia Pneumatis alml : 
Me juvat: et faciat complere quod utile fiat. 
Si pueri primo nequeunt attendere plene, 
Hie tamen attendat, qui doctoris est vice fungens, 
Atque legens pueris laica lingua reserabit, 
Et pueris etiam pars maxima plana patebit. 
Voces in primls, quas par casus variabis, 
Ut levius protero, te declinare docebo. 
etc. etc. 



290 APPENDIX. 

If Alexander kept his promise, he certainly had no 
faculty for making things easy. Take, e. g., his notion 
of teaching the singular of the first declension: 

Rectus as, es, a, dat declinatio prima, 
Atqiie per am propria quaedam ponuntur hebraea; 
Dans ce dipthongon genitivis atqua dativis. 
Am servat quartus, tamen an aut en reperimus, 
Cum rectus fit in as vel in es, vel cum dat a Grgecus, 
Eectus in a Grseci f acit an quarto breviari. 
Quintus in a dabitur, post es tamen e reperitur. 
A sextus, tamen es quandoque per e dare debes 
Am recti repetes.'quinto sextum sociando. 

I read this wonderful grammar (not much of it, how- 
ever) with great satisfaction. Our researches sometimes 
bring a feeling of despondency, and we think that 
knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers. But here is some 
evidence to the contrary. Part of the knowledge given 
by Alexander about the first declension has, happily, 
never come even to most teachers of the present day; 
and, however unsatisfactory may be our condition with 
regard to wisdom, we certainly are in advance of those 
masters who used the " Doctrinale." 



LILY'S GRAMMAR. 

In some respects further simplification has since been 
effected, as, e. g., in the matter of genders. The " Short 
Introduction of Grammar," commonly called the "King's 
Book," and afterward "Lily's Grammar," [see page 35], 
made this startling assertion : — " Genders of nounes be 
seven: the masculine, the feminine, the neuter, the com- 
mune of two, the commune of three, the doubtful, and 



LILYS GRAMMAR. 291 

the epiceoe." The ingenious authors seem not to have 
discovered any Latin substantive which they were able 
tergeminis tollere honor ib us ; so they take rather unfair ad- 
vantage of the fact that adjectives in x do not vary in 
the nominative, and give this exaniple of the common of 
three — " The commune of three is declined with hie, 
haec, and hoc: as hie, hsec, and hoc, Felix, Happy." In 
justice to the old book, I must say, however, that some 
of the later simplifications were so managed as to be 
•doubtful improvements. Lily's Grammar put the prep- 
osition a before all ablatives. This was simplified into 
the blunder of putting it before none, and teaching boys, 
€. g., that Domino alone was Latin for " by a lord." The 
old grammar had an optative mood with utinam ( Utinam 
mm, "I pray Grod I be;" Utinam essem, "Would God I 
were," etc.) and a subjunctive with cum {cum sim, "when 
I am," etc.) These gave place to the mysterious an- 
nouncement of the Eton Grammar, "The subjunctive 
mood is declined like the potential." The old book 
has besides Lily's Carmen de Moribus, the Apostles' 
Creed, etc., in Latin verse. The following classical ver- 
sion of the Lord's Prayer is curious, and reminds one of 
Rennaissance architecture: — 

O Pater omnipotens, clarique habitator Olympi, 

Laudetur merito nomen lionore tuum. 
Adveaiat regnum. Tua sit rata ubique voluntas, 

Fiat et in terris, sicut in arce poli. 
Da nobis hodie panem, et nos exime noxae, 

Ut veniam nostris tiostibus usque damns. 
Nee sine tentando Stygius nos opprimat Error; 

Fac animas nostras ut mala nulla ligent. 
Amen. 

Our Lord's command, " Go teach all nations," is thus 
rendered: — 



292 APPENDIX. 

Ite per extremas 6 vos mea viscera gentes: 
Cunctos doctrinam rite docete meam. 

Inque Patris, Natique et Flatus nomine Sancti 
Mortales undis sponte lavate sacris. 



COLET. 



From "Joannis Coleti theologi, olim Decani Divi 
Pauli, editio, una cum quibusdam G. Lilli Grammatices 
Rudimentis, etc. Antuerpiae 1530." [See page 35.] 
After the accidence of the eight parts of speech, he says: 

" Of these eight parts of speech, in order well con- 
strued, be made reasons and sentences and long orations. 
But how and in what manner, and with what construc- 
tions of words, and all the varieties, and diversities, and 
changes in Latin speech (which be innumerable), if any 
man will know, and by that knowledge attain to under- 
stand Latin books, and to speak and to write clean Latin, 
let him, above all, busily learn and read good Latin 
authors of chosen poets and orators, and note wisely 
how they wrote and spake; and study always to follow 
them, desiring none other rules but their examples. For 
in the beginning men spake not Latin because such rules 
were made, but, contrary wise, because men spake such 
Latin, upon that followed the rules, and were made. 
That is to say, Latin speech was before the rules, and 
not the rules before the Latin speech. Wherefore, well 
beloved masters and teachers of grammar, after the 
parts of speech sufficiently known in our schools, read 
and expound plainly unto your scholars, good authors, 
and show to them [in] every word, and in every sen- 



COLET. MULCASTER. 293 

tence, what they shall note and observe, warning them 
busily to follow and do like both in writing and in 
speaking; and be to them your own self also, speaking 
with them the pure Latin very present, and leave the 
rules; for reading of good books, diligent information 
of learned masters, studious advertence and taking heed 
of learners, hearing eloquent men speak, and finally, 
busy imitation with tongue and pen, more availeth 
shortly to get the true eloquent speech, than all the tra- 
ditions, rules, and precepts of masters." 



MULCASTER. 

Richard Mulcaster, who, in the second half of the six- 
teenth century, was the first head-master of Merchant 
Tailors' School, and in 1596 became headmaster of St. 
Paul's School, was a celebrated man in his day, and was 
highly esteemed by Bishop Andrews, who had been his 
pupil, and always kept a portrait of him hung up in his 
study. Mulcaster has left us two curious books on edu- 
cation, the " Positions," and the " Elementarie " [see 
page 45 j. The following defense of the use of English 
by the learned, is from the latter: — 

" Is it not a marvelous bondage to become servants to 
one tongue, for learning's sake, the most part of our 
time, with loss of most time, whereas we may have the 
very same treasure in our own tongue with the gain of 
most time? our own bearing the joyful title of our lib- 
erty and freedom, the Latin tongue remembering us of 
our thraldom and bondage ? I love Rome, but London 



294 APPENDIX. 

better; I favor Italy, but England more: I honor the 
Latin, but I worship the English. ... I honor for- 
eign tongues, but wish my own to be partaker of their 
honor. Knowing them, I wish my own tongue to re- 
semble their grace. I confess iheir furniture, and wish 
it were ours. . . . The diligent labor of learned 
countrymen did so enrich those tongues, and not the 
tongues themselves; though they proved very pliable^ 
as our tongue will prove, I dare assure it, of knowledge, 
if our learned countrymen will put to their labor. And 
why not, I pray you, as well in English as either Latin 
or any tongue else ? Will ye say it is needless ? sure 
that will not hold. If loss of time, while ye be pilgrims 
to learning, by lingering about tongues be no argument 
of need; if lack of sound skill while the tongue distract- 
eth sense more than half to itself, and that most of all 
in a simple student or a silly wit, be no argument of 
need, then ye say somewhat which pretend no need. 
But because we needed not to lose any time unless we 
listed, if we had such a vantage, in the course of study,, 
as we now lose while we travail in tongues; and because 
our understanding also were most full in our natural 
speech, though we know the foreign exceedingly well — 
methink necessity itself doth call for English, whereby all 
that gaiety may be had at home which makes us gaze so 
much at the fine stranger." 

Among various objections to the use of English which 
he answers, he comes to this one: — 

" But will ye thus break off the common conference 
with the learned foreign ? " 

To this his answer is not very forcible: — 

" The conference will not cease while the people have 



MULCASTER. 295 

cause to interchange dealings, and without the Latin it 
may well be continued: as in some countries the learn- 
eder sort and some near cousins to the Latin itself do 
already wean their pens and tongues from the use of the 
Latin, both in written discourse and spoken disputation 
into their own natural, and yet no dry nurse being so 
well appointed by the milch nurse's help." 

Further on he says: — 

" The Emperor Justinian said, when he made the 
Institutes of force, that the students were happy in hav- 
ing such a foredeal [i. e., advantage — German Vortheil] 
as to hear him at once, and not to wait four years first. 
And doth not our languaging hold us back four years 
and that full, think you ? . . [But this is not all.] 
Our best understanding is in our natural tongue, and all 
our foreign learning is applied to our use by means of 
our own; and without the application to particular use, 
wherefore serves learning ? . , . [As for dishonoring 
antiquity], if we must cleave to the eldest and not the 
best, we should be eating acorns and wearing old Adam's 
pelts. But why not all in English, a tongue of itself 
both deep in conceit and frank in delivery ? I do not 
think that any language, be it whatsoever, is better able 
to utter all arguments either with more pith or greater 
plainness than our English tongue is. . . . It is our 
accident which restrains our tongue and not the tongue 
itself, which will strain with the strongest and stretch 
to the furthest, for either government if we were con- 
querors, or for cunning if we were treasurers; not any 
whit behind either the subtle Greek for couching close, 
or the stately Latin for spreading fair." 

There is much more in the same strain, but I have al- 



296 APPENDIX. 

ready quoted enough to show how vigorously a learned 
man and a schoolmaster in the sixteenth century took 
the side of the vernacular against the Latin language. 
The " Elementaire " is now, of course, a scarce book. 
There are two copies of it in the British Museum, but 
none that I have been able to discover of the " Posi- 
tions." 



WORDS AND THINGS. 

This antithesis between words and things which con- 
stantly occurs in educational literature, from the six- 
teenth century onward [see page 45], is not very exact. 
Sometimes the antithesis so expressed is really between 
the material world and abstract ideas. In this case the 
study of things which affect the senses is opposed to the 
study of grammar, logic, rhetoric, etc. Sometimes by 
words is understood the expression of ideas in different 
languages, and by things the ideas themselves. This is 
the antithesis of those who depreciate linguistic study, 
and say that it is better to acquire fresh ideas than vari- 
ous ways of expressing the same idea. Of course it may 
be shown, that linguistic study does more for us than 
merely giving us various ways of expressing ideas, but 
I will not here discuss the matter. Besides the dispu- 
tants who use one or other of these antitheses, many of 
those who find fault with the attention bestowed on 
words in education, mean generally words learned by 
rote, and not connected with ideas at all. 

Several of our greatest writers have declared in one 
sense or other against " words." First, both in time and 
importance, we have Milton: 



WORDS AND THINGS. 297 

"The end of all learning is to repair the ruins of our 
first parents by regaining to know God aright, and out 
of that knowledge to love Him, to imitate Him, to be 
like Him, as we may the nearest by possessing our 
souls of true virtue, which being united to the heavenly 
grace of faith, makes up the highest perfection. But 
because our understanding can not in this body found 
itself but on sensible things, nor arrive so clearly to the 
knowledge of God, and things invisible as by orderly 
conning over the visible and inferior creature, the same 
method is necessarily to be followed in all discreet teach- 
ing. And seeing every nation affords not experience 
and tradition enough for all kinds of learning, therefore 
we are chiefly taught the language of those people who 
have at any time been most industrious after wisdom: 
so that language is but the instrument conveying to us 
things useful to be known. And though a linguist 
should pride himself to have all the tongues that Babel 
cleft the world into, yet if he have not studied solid 
things in them, as well as the words and lexicons, he 
were nothing so much to be esteemed a learned man, as 
any yeoman or tradesman completely wise in his mother 
dialect only."* 

Soon after we find Cowley complaining of the loss 
which children make of their time at most schools, em- 
ploying, or rather casting away, six or seven years in 
the learning of words only; and he designs a school in 
which things should be taught together with language. 
{Proposition for the Advancement of Experimental Philosophy.) 
Both Milton and Cowley wished that boys should read 

* Tract to Hartlib. [School Room Classics, vi, pp. 7, 8.] 



298 APPENDIX. 

such Latin books as would instruct them in husbandry, 
etc., and so combine linguistic knowledge with " real " 
knowledge. 

In the fourth book of the " Dunciad," the most con- 
summate master of words thus uses his power to satirize 
verbal education: — 

Then thus since man from beast by words is known, 
Words are man's province, words we teach alone. 

***** 

To ask, to guess, to know, as they commence, 
As fancy opens the quick springs of sense. 
We ply the memory, we loan the brain, 
Bind rebel wit, and double chain on chain, 
Confine the thought to exercise the breath, 
And keep them in the pale of words till death. 

(Lines 148 if.) 

Cowper, too, says: — 

And is he well content his son should find 

No nourishment to feed his growing mind 

But conjugated verbs, and nouns declined? 

For such is all the mental food purveyed 

By public hackneys in the schooling trade ; 

Who feed a pupil's intellect with store 

Of syntax truly, but with little more ; 

Dismiss their cares when they dismiss their flock; 

Machines themselves, and governed by a clock. 

Perhaps a father blessed with any brains 

Would deem it no abuse or waste of pains, 

'T' improve this diet, at no great expense. 

With sav'ry truth and wholesome common sense; 

To lead his son, for prospects of delight, 

To some not steep tho' philosophic height, 

Thence to exhibit to his wondering eyes 

Yon circling worlds, their distance and their size, 

The moons of Jove and Saturn's belted ball, 

And the harmonious order of them all; 

To show him In an insect or a flower 

Such microscopic proof of skill and power, 

As, hid from ages past, God now displays 

To combat atheists with in modern days; 

To spread the earth before him, and commend, 

With designation of the finger's end. 



WORDS AND THINGS. 299 

Its various parts to his attentive note, 
Thus bringing home to him the most remote : 
To teach his lieart to glow with generous flame. 
Caught from the deeds of men of ancient fame.* 

On the other side we have Dr. Johnson: — 
" The truth is, that the knowledge of external nature 
and the sciences which that knowledge requires or in- 
cludes, are not the great or the frequent business of the 
human mind. Whether we provide for action or for 
conversation, whether we wish to be useful or pleasing, 
the first requisite is the religious and moral knowledge 
of right and wrong: the next is an acquaintance with 
the history of mankind, and with those examples which 
may be said to embody truth and prove by events the 
reasonableness of opinions. Prudence and justice are 
virtues and excellences of all times and of all places; we 
are perpetually moralists, but we are geometricians only 
by chance. Our intercourse with intellect, not nature,, 
is necessary; our speculations upon matter are voluntary 
and at leisure. Physiological learning is of such rare 
emergency, that one may know another half his life 
without being able to estimate his skill in hydrostatics 
or astronomy; but his moral and prudential character 
immediately appears. Those authors, therefore, are to 
be read at schools that supply most axioms of prudence, 
most principles of moral truth, and most materials for 
conversation; and these purposes are best served by 
poets, orators, and historians."! 

In more recent times the increasing importance of 
natural science has drawn many of the best intellects 

* Tirocinium. 
t Life of Milton. 



300 APPENDIX. 

into its serWce. Linguistic and literary instruction now 
finds few supporters in theory, though its friends have 
not yet made much alteration in their practice. Our 
last two School Commissions have recommended a com- 
promise between the claims of literature and natural 
science. Both reports state clearly the importance of 
a training in language and literature, to which our pres- 
ent theorists hardly seem to do justice. The Public 
Schools Report says: — 

" Grammar is the logic of common speech, and there 
are few educated men who are%not sensible of the ad- 
vantages they gained, as boys, from the steady practice 
of composition and translation, and from their introduc- 
tion to etymology. The study of literature is the study, 
not indeed of the physical, but of the intellectual and 
moral world we live in, and of the thoughts, lives, and 
characters of those men whose writings or whose memo- 
Ties succeeding generations have thought it worth while 
to preserve." * 

The Commissioners on Middle Schools express a simi- 
lar opinion: — 

"The 'human' subjects of instruction, of which the 
study of language is the beginning, appear to have a 
distinctly greater educational power than the 'material.* 
As all civilization really takes its rise in human inter- 
course, so the most efficient instrument of education ap- 
pears to be the study which most bears on that inter- 
course, the study of human speech. Nothing appears to 
develop and discipline the whole man so much as the 
study which assists the learner to understand the 
thoughts, to enter into the feelings, to appreciate the 

* Public Schools Report, i. 28. § 8. 



301 

moral judgments of others. There is nothing so opposed 
to true cultivation, nothing so unreasonable, as excessive 
narrowness of mind; and nothing contributes to remove 
this narrowness so much as that clear understanding of 
language which lays open the thoughts of others to 
ready appreciation. Nor is equal clearness of thought 
to be obtained in any other way. Clearness of thought 
is bound up with clearness of language, and the one is 
impossible without the other. When the study of lan- 
guage can be followed by that of literature, not only 
breadth and clearness, but refinement becomes attahia- 
ble. The study of history in the full sense belongs to a 
still later age: for till the learner is old enough to have 
some appreciation of politics, he is not capable of grasp- 
ing the meaning of what he studies. But both litera- 
ture and history do but carry on that which the study 
of language has begun, the cultivation of all those fac- 
ulties by which man has contact with man." * 



AXIOMATIC TRUTHS OF METHODOLOGY, f 

1. The method of nature is the archetype of all 
methods, and especially of the method of learning lan- 
guages. 

2. The classification of the objects of study should 
mark out to teacher and learner their respective spheres 
of action. 

3. The ultimate objects of the study should always be 

* Middle Schools Report, ii. 22. 
t [Compare page 46.] 



302 APPENDIX. 

kept in view, that the end be not forgotten in pursuit of 
the means. 

4. The means ought to be consistent with the end. 

5. Example and practice are more efficient than pre- 
cept and theory. 

6. Only one thing should be tauo^ht at one time; and 
an accumulation of difficulties should be avoided, espe- 
cially in the beginning of the study. 

7. Instruction should proceed from the known to the 
unknown, from the simple to the complex, from concrete 
to abstract notions, from analysis to synthesis. 

8. The mind should be impressed with the idea before 
it takes cognizance of the sign that represents it. 

9. The development of the intellectual powers is more 
important than the acquisition of knowledge; each 
should be made auxiliary to the other. 

10. All the faculties should be equally exercised, and 
exercised in any way consistent with the exigencies of 
active life. 

11. The protracted exercise of the faculties is injuri- 
ous: a change of occupation renews the energy of their 
action, 

12. No exercise should be so difficult as to discourage 
•exertion, nor so easy as to render it unnecessary; atten- 
tion is secured by making study interesting. 

13. First impressions and early habits are the most 
important, because they are the most enduring. 

14. What the learner discovers by mental exertion is 
better known than what is told him. 

15. Learners should not do with their instructor what 
they can do by themselves, that they may have time to 
^o with him what they can not do by themselves. 



COMENIUS. *303 

16. The monitorial principle multiplies the benefits of 
public instruction. By teaching we learn. 

17. The more concentrated is the professor's teaching, 
the more comprehensive and efficient his instruction. 

18. In a class, the time must be so employed, that no 
learner shall be idle, and the business so contrived, that 
learners of different degrees of advancement shall derive 
equal advantage from the instructor. 

19. Repetition must mature into a habit what the 
learner wishes to remember. 

20. Young persons should be taught only what they 
are capable of clearly understanding, and what may be 
useful to them in after-life.* 



FROM " JANUA LINGUARUM."t 

480. Of Journeys and Passages. — Let a traveler go 
straightway whither he is going without turnings; let 
him not turn or stray out of the way into by-way es. 
481. Let him not leave the highway for a foot-path; un- 
less it be a beaten path or a way much used, or that the 
guide or companion know the way . . . 483. A 
forked way or carfax (bivium aut quadrivium) is deceit- 
ful and uncertain. . . . 486. Boots are fit for one 
that goeth far from home, or shoes of raw leather be- 
cause of the mire and dirt; and a broad hat or cover of 
the head because of the sunne, and a cloak to keep from 

*From Marcel ou Language. London, 1853. As M. Marcel shows a 
thorough mastery of his subject, he may be trusted as giving the com- 
monly received conclusions. 

t [See pp. 75-78.] 



304 APPENDIX. 

rain, and a staffe to rely or lean upon, for it is a help and 
a support. 48'7. There is likewise need of provision to 
make expenses, and to bear the charges, or at least of 
letters of exchange. 488. But of patience withall; for 
it happeneth or cometh to pass sometimes to be all the 
night abroad or in the open aire. 489. Wheresoever or 
in what place soever thou be consider with whom thou 
art. 490. For robbers and thieves seek for a prey or 
bootie; pirates a spoil; yea, which is more, a guest or 
stranger is not sure or out of danger from his host. 
(Latrones enim prsedantur: piratse spoliant: imo in hos- 
pitio non hospes ab hospite tutus.) 491. Bags, packs, 
or fardles, wherein they carry their own things or bag- 
gage trussed; are a budget, a wallet, cap case, a pouch, 
a sachell, a male, a purse, a bag of leather. 492. To be 
more ready, do not burden nor charge or aggravate thy- 
self with lets. 493. If there be necessity to make haste, 
it's better to use running horses or swift geldings or 
hunting nags than post-horses. 494. Being returned 
home safe and sound, thine shall receive and entertain 
thee with joy and gladness. — [Edition of 1639, p. 84.) 



LOCKE ON POETRY.* 

" If he have a poetic vein, it is to 'me the strangest 
thing in the world that the father should desire or suffer 
it to be cherished or improved. Methinks the parents 
should labor to have it stifled and suppressed as much as 
may be; and I know not what reason a father can have 



See page 104.] 



PESTALOZZI. 305 

to wish his son a poet, who does not desire to have him bid 
defiance to all other callings and business: which is not 
yet the worst of the case; for if he prove a successful 
rhymer, and gets once the reputation of a wit, I desire it 
to be considered what company and places he is like to 
spend his time in, nay, and estate too; for it is very sel- 
dom seen that any one discovers mines of gold or silver 
in Parnassus. It is a pleasant air, but a barren soil; and 
there are very few instances of those who have added to 
their patrimony by anything they have reaped from 
thence. Poetry and gaming, which usually go together,, 
are alike io this too, that they seldom bring any advan- 
tage but to those who have nothing else to live on. Men 
of estates almost constantly go away losers; and it is 
well if they escape at a cheaper rate than their whole 
estates, or the greatest part of them. If, therefore, you 
would not have your son the fiddle to every jovial com- 
pany, without whom the sparks could not relish their 
wine, nor know how to pass an afternoon idly; if you 
would not have him waste his time and estate to divert 
others, and contemn the dirty acres left him by his an- 
cestors, I do not think you will much care he should be 
a poet, or that his schoolmaster should enter him in ver- 
sifying."-(§ 174.) 



FROM THE "EVENING HOUR OF A HERMIT."* 

What man is, what he needs, what elevates him and 
degrades him, what strengthens him and weakens him, 

* [See page 165.] 
S 



306 APPENDIX. 

such is the knowledge needed both by shepherds of the 
people, and by the inmate of the most lowly hut. 

Everywhere humanity feels this want. Everywhere 
it struggles to satisfy it with labor and earnestness. 
For the want of it men live restless lives, and at death 
they cry aloud that they have not fulfilled the purposes 
of their being. Their end is not the ripening of the 
perfect fruits of the year, which in full completion are 
laid away for the repose of the winter. . . . 

The powers of conferring blessings on humanity are 
not a gift of art or of accident. They exist with their 
fundamental principles in the inmost nature of all men. 
Their development is the universal need of humanity. 

Central point of life, individual destiny of man, thou 
art the book of Nature, In thee lieth the power and the 
plan of that wise teacher; and every school education 
not erected upon the principles of human development 
leads astray. 

The happy infant learns by this road what his mother 
is to him; and thus grows within him the actual senti- 
ment of love and gratitude before he can understand 
the words Duty or Thanks. . . . The truth which 
rises from our inmost being is universal human truth, 
and would serve as a truth for the reconciliation of those 
who are quarreling by thousands over its husks. 

Man, it is thyself, the inner consciousness of thy pow- 
ers, which is the object of the education of nature. 

The general elevation of these inward powers of the 
human mind to a pure human wisdom is the universal 
purpose of the education even of the lowest man. The 
practice, application, and use of these powers and this 
wisdom under special circumstances and conditions of 



PESTALOZZI. 307 

humanity, is education for a professional or social condi- 
tion. These must always be kept subordinate to the 
general object of human training. . . . 

Nature develops all the human faculties by practice, 
and their growth depends upon their exercise. . . . 

Men, fathers, force not the faculties of your children 
into paths too distant before they have attained strength 
by exercise; and avoid harshness and over-fatigue. . 

(You leave the right order) when, before making 
them sensitive to truth and wisdom by the real knowl- 
edge of actual objects, you engage them in the thousand- 
fold confusions of word-learning and opinions; and lay 
the foundation of their mental character and of the 
first determination of their powers, not with truth and 
actual obligations, but with sounds and speech and 
words. . . . 

God is the nearest resource for humanity. . . . 

To suffer pain and death and the grave, without God, 
thy nature, educated to mildness, goodness, and feeling 
has no power. . . . 

Believe in thyself, O man; believe in the inward intel- 
ligence of thine own soul; thus shalt thou believe in 
God and immortality. 

Faith in the fatherhood of God is faith in immor- 
tality. . . . 

Faith in my own father, who is a child of God, is a 
training for my faith in God. 

Faith in God sanctifies and strengthens the bond be- 
tween parents and children, between subjects and 
princes. Unbelief dissolves all bonds, destroys all 
blessing. 



308 APPENDIX. 

Freedom rests on justice, justice on love; therefore 
even freedom rests on love. 

The true disposition of the child is the right source of 
freedom resting on justice, as the true disposition of the 
father is the source of all power of government which 
is exalted enough to do justice and to love freedom. 
And the source of justice and of all blessing for the 
world, the source of love and brotherly feeling among 
men, rests on the great thought of religion that we are 
children of God, and that belief of this truth is the 
sure ground of all blessing for the world. . . . 

That men have lost the disposition of children toward 
God is the greatest misfortune of the world, inasmuch 
as it renders impossible all God's fatherly education of 
them; and the restoring of this lost childlike disposition 
is the redemption of the lost children of God upon 
earth. 

The Man of God who, with suffering and death, 
restored to mankind the universally lost feeling of the 
child's disposition toward God, is the Redeemer of the 
World. He is the great sacrificed Priest of the Lord^ 
He is the Mediator between God and God-forgetting 
mankind. His teaching is pure justice, educating peo- 
ple's philosophy; it is the revelation of God to His lost 
race of children. 



FROM RAMSAUER. 

As many hundred times in the course of the year as 
foreigners visited the Pestalozzian Institution [see page 
174], so many hundred times did Pestalozzi allow him- 



PESTALOZZI. 309 

self in his enthusiasm to be deceived by them. On the 
arrival of every fresh visitor, he would go to the teach- 
ers in whom he placed most confidence, and say to them, 
^' This is an important personage, who wants to become 
acquainted Avith all we are doing. Take your best pu- 
pils and their analysis-books (copy-books in which the 
lessons were written out), and show him what we can 
do, and what we wish to do." Hundreds and hundreds 
of times there came to the Institution silly, curious, and 
often totally uneducated persons, who came because it 
was the fashion. On their account we usually had to 
interrupt the class instruction, and hold a kind of exami- 
nation. In 1814, the aged Prince Esterhazy came. Pes- 
talozzi ran all over the house, calling out, " Ramsauer, 
Ramsauer, where are you ! Come directly, with your 
best pupils, to the Maison Rouge (the hotel at which the 
Prince had alighted). He is a person of the highest 
importance and of infinite wealth; he has thousands of 
serfs in Hungary and Austria. He is certain to build 
schools and set free his serfs, if he is made to take an 
interest in the matter." I took about fifteen pupils to 
the hotel. Pestalozzi presented me to the Prince with 
these words, " This is the teacher of these scholars, a 
young man who, fifteen years ago, migrated with other 
poor children from the Canton of Appenzell and came to 
me. He received an elementary education according to 
his aptitudes, without let or hindrance. Now he is a 
teacher himself. Thus you see that there is as much 
ability in the poor as in the richest, frequently more, but 
it is seldom developed, and even then not methodically. 
It is for this reason that the improvement of the popular 
schools is so highly important. But he will show you 



310 APPENDIX. 

everything we do better than I could. I will, therefore^ 
leave him with you for the present." I now examined 
the pupils, taught, explained, and bawled, in my zeal^ 
till I was quite hoarse, believing that the Prince was 
thoroughly convinced about everything. At the end of 
an hour Pestalozzi returned. The Prince expressed 
his pleasure at what he had seen. He then took leave, 
and Pestalozzi, standing on the top of the stairs of the 
hotel, said, " He is quite convinced, quite convinced, 
and will certainly establish schools on his Hungarian 
estates." When we had descended the stairs, Pestalozzi 
said, " Whatever ails my arm ! It is so painful ! Why^ 
see, it is quite swollen ; I can't bend it ! " And in truth 
his wide sleeve was now too small for his arm. I looked 
at the key of the house-door of the Maison Rouge, and 
said to Pestalozzi, " Look here ! you struck yourself 
against this key when we were going to the Prince an 
hour ago ! " On closer observation, it appeared that 
Pestalozzi had actually bent the key by hitting his elbow 
against it. In the first hour afterward he had nat 
noticed the pain for the excess of his zeal and his joy.* 



HELPS, STEPHEN, ETC.f 

Mr. Helps, in his admirable essay on reading, in 
" Friends in Council," makes some observations which^ 
although they refer to the reading of grown persons,, 
may be applied to early education as well. He would 
have every one " take something for the main stem and 

*For an account of Rarasauer, see Barnard's Pestalozzi. 
t [Compare pages 206, 207.] 



311 

trunk of their culture, whence branches might grow out 
in all directions, seeking light and air for the parent 
tree, which it is hoped might end in becoming something 
useful and ornamental, and which, at any rate, all along 
will have had life and growth in it." 

He concludes his remarks on the connection of knowl- 
edges as follows: — 

*' In short, all things are so connected together that a 
man who knows one subject well, can not, if he would, 
have failed to have acquired much besides; and that man 
will not be likely to keep fewer pearls who has a string 
to put them on, than he who picks them up and throws 
them together without method. This, however, is a 
very poor metaphor to represent the matter; for what I 
would aim at producing, not merely holds together what 
is gained, but has vitality in itself — is always growing. 
And anybody will confirm this who, in his own case, has 
had any branch of study or human affairs to work upon; 
for he must have observed how all he meets seems to 
work in with, and assimilate itself to, his own peculiar sub- 
ject. During his lonely walks, or in society, or in action, 
it seems as if this one pursuit were something almost in- 
dependent of himself, always on the watch, and claiming 
its share in whatever is going on." 

Sir James Stephens also made some excellent remarks 
to the same effect in his lecture on " Desultory and Sys- 
tematic Reading," delivered at Exeter Hall: — 

"By sound — that is solid — learning," (he said), "I 
mean such knowledge as relates to useful and substantial 
things, and as in itself is compact, coherent, all of a 
piece — having its several parts fitted into each other, 
and mutually sustaining and illustrating one another." 



312 • APPENDIX. 

We must with a firm hand draw our own meridian 
line in the world of learning: — 

"For learning is a world, not a chaos. The various 
accumulations of human knowledge are not so many de- 
tached masses. They are all connected parts of one 
great system of truth, and though that system be infinite- 
ly too comprehensive for any one of us to compass, yet 
each component member of it bears to every other com- 
ponent member relations which each of us may, in his 
own department of study, search out and discover for 
himself. A man is really and soundly learned in exact 
proportion to the number and to the importance of those 
relations which he has thus carefully examined and ac- 
curately understood." 

In discussing the advantage of learning one subject 
thoroughly, we must not overlook the valuable testimony 
of Professor De Morgan. 

"When the student has occupied his time in learning 
a moderate portion of many different things, what has 
he acquired — extensive knowledge or useful habits ? 
Even if he can be said to have varied learning, it will 
not long be true of him, for nothing flies so quickly as 
half-digested knowledge; and when this is gone, there 
remains but a slender portion of useful power. A small 
quantity of learning quickly evaporates from a mind 
which never held any learning except in small quantities; 
and the intellectual philosopher can perhaps exj^lain the 
following phenomenon — that men who have given deep 
attention to one or more liberal studies, can learn to the 
end of their lives, and are able to retain and apply very 
small quantities of other kinds of knowledge; while those 
who have never learnt much of any one thing seldom 



813 

acquire new knowledge after they attain to years of ma- 
turity, and frequently lose the greater part of that which 
they once possessed." 

I am indebted for this quotation to Mr. Payne's pam- 
phlet, "The Curriculum of Modern Education, etc." 
1866.* This pamphlet contains a most interesting dis- 
cussion of the questions — Many subjects or few ? and, 
Shall language or science have precedence ? In consid- 
ering these matters, Mr. Payne has an advantage pos- 
sessed by at present by very few Englishmen — knowledge 
derived both from teaching, and from studying the the- 
ory of teaching. Vide his evidence before Middle Schools 
Commission. 



MANGNALL'S QUESTIONS. 

The long-continued success of this book is a melan- 
choly proof of the stupidity which is at work, vigorously 
destroying the intelligence of youthful minds. When I 
referred to "Mangnall" [!^ee page 179], I did so from 
what I remember of my own early lessons. On getting 
the book to see if it was as bad as 1 thought, I am almost 
driven to the supposition that it was written as a satire 
on the instruction generally given to children, and that it 
has imposed on as the Epistolce Ohscurorum Virorum did on 
some of the Roman clergy. The edition now in use 
begins as follows: — 

'^ Name some of the most Ancient Kingdoms. — Chaldea, 
Babylonia, Assyria, China in Asia, and Egyjjt in Africa. 

* [Now published in his " Lectures," Complete Edition, pp. 237-280.] 



314 APPENDIX. 

Nimrod, the grandson of Ham, is supposed to have 
founded the first of the these b. c. 2221, as well as the 
famous cities of Babylon and Nineveh: his kingdom be- 
ing within the fertile plains of Chaldea, Ohalonitis, and 
Assyria, was of small extent, compared with the vast 
empires that afterward arose from it, but included several 
large cities. In the portion called Babylonia, were the 
cities of Babylon, Barsita, Idacarra, and Vologsia, etc." 

This is the opening of an historical sketch which in 
twelve pages brings matters down to a. d. 1849. The 
information given about Greece is of this kind: — 

" What progress did the Greeks make in the Arts? — From 
the time of Cyrus to that of Alexander, they were grad- 
ually improving: warriors, statesmen, philosophers, poets, 
historians, painters, architects, and sculptors form a 
glorious phalanx in this go! deu age of literature; and the 
history of Greece at this period is equally important and 
instructive. 

'' Name the chief Grecian Poets. — Homer, Hesiod, Archi- 
lochus, Tyrtaeus, Alcseus, Sappho, Simonides, ^schylus, 
Euripides, Sophocles, Anacreon, Pindar and Menander. 

" Name the chief Philosophers. — Thales, Solon, Pythago- 
ras, Heraclitus, Anaxagoras, Socrates, Erapedocles, Plato,. 
Aristotle, and Zeno. 

'■'■Name the chief Lawgivers. — Cecrops, of Athens; Cad- 
mus, of Thebes; Caranus, of Macedon; Lycurgus, of 
Sparta; Draco and Solon, of Athens. 

'■^ Name the chief Grecian Painters. — Zeuxis, Parrhasius, 
Timanthes, Apelles, Polygnotus, Protogenes, and Aristi- 
des. 

" Name the chief Historians. — Herodotus, Thucydides, 
and Xenophon. 



315 

" Name the chief Grecian Architects. — Ctesiphon, Phidias,. 
MyroD, Scopas, Lysippns, and Polycletus." 

A " sketch of the most remarkable eveuts from the 
Christian era to the close of the eighteenth century," oc- 
cupies seven pages. The abstract of British biography 
is very complete, and takes eighty-two pages. To pre- 
vent the memory from getting assisted by association of 
ideas, as it might if chronological order were adopted, 
the worthies are given alphabetically. Though the list 
is tolerably complete the author adheres pretty closely^ 
to her principle, that the only thing which we really 
ought to know about great men is their names. Take a 
couple as they stand:— 

*' Gilbert Burnet, Bishop of Salisbury, born in Edin- 
burgshire, 1643; died in 1715. He is memorable as an 
historical and political writer. 

''Richard Bentley, born at Wakefield, 1662; died 
1742. His literary character as a critic and divine is 
known throughout Europe." 

In this last case, the reader will observe that children 
are taught but little, and that little wrong. Another 
striking feature about these biographical sketches is, that 
their length does not vary according to the importance 
of the person treated of. We find, e. g., sixteen and a 
half lines (space enough in such a work as this for the 
literary and political history of an empire or two) de- 
voted to Jeremiah Horrox, " who continues to be re- 
garded with admiration." 

The sketch of general modern biography takes seven^ 
ty-three pages; planetary system, two pages; list of con- 
stellations, three pages; abstract of heathen mythology, 
eight pages, etc. I could not give all the subjects- 



316 APPENDIX. 

treated of without transcribing a greater portion of the 
work than courtesy or copyright would allow. 



DR. WIESE. 

As far as literature is concerned, the Reformers [com- 
pare pages 211, 212] have been as triumphant lately in 
education as in politics. Indeed, it seems considered 
almost axiomatic that he who writes on a liberal educa- 
tion must himself be a Liberal,* Some of these writers 
hardly justify Mr. Mill's remark, that all stupid people 
are Tories, and some others, in tilting at the present 
state of things, endeavor as it were to make up by 
velocity for want of weight. But there are other mal- 
contents who are not rhetoricians, and who are among 
the intellectual leaders of our time. We can not afford 
to neglect protests from men so eminent, and observing 
from such different standing-points, as Mill, Spencer, 
Tyndall, Huxley, Seeley, Matthew Arnold. Some of 
these gentlemen are not merely dissatisfied with English 
education, but they they have found in Germany a 
model worthy of our imitation. When they descend in 
this manner from the ideal to the actual, we Philistines f 
feel more at home with them. We like to see in a con- 

* There are a few noteworthy exceptions to this rule, as Professor 
Conington and Mr. Church, who are both brave enough to defend Latin 
Terses. See Co itemporary Review, January and May, 1868. 

fl hope I shall not be understood as ranking myself among the ene- 
mies of light or Geist or ideas, still less among the enemies of the " chil- 
dren of light " who are so well represented in this country by Mr. Arnold. 
I mean merely that I liave no pretensions to be of their number, and that 
I can never aspire beyond being admitted as a proselyte of the Gate. 



ENGLISH VS GEEMAN SCHOOLS. 317 

Crete form what the Reformers would introduce, and 
when we are thus convinced that the change would be 
for the better, we no longer feel any misgivings in 
adopting it. But in all such cases we must be very- 
careful that the superiority of the thing to be introduced 
is clearly demonstrated; and in listening to the admirers 
of foreign systems we sometimes wish for an opportunity 
of following out the maxim Audi alteram partem [Hear 
the other side]. Perhaps we remember that in our nur- 
sery experiences, the good little boy next door was fre- 
quently referred to as presenting a striking contrast 
with our own unworthiness, while perhaps in the adja- 
cent nursery we were figuring in the same capacity for 
the humiliation of the good little boy himself. After 
listening to the praises of the good little German boy 
who is such a prodigy of learning, and, as Mr. Mathias 
has shown, is required to pass a harder examination on 
leaving school than our poUmen are when they leave the 
University, I take a malicious pleasure in being present 
(so to speak) at a lecture delivered for the benefit of 
that young gentleman, in which his failings are freely 
touched upon in connection with the English boy's cor- 
responding virtues. 

I refer to Dr. Wiese's " Letters on English Educa- 
tion." (English by W. D. Arnold, 1854.)* Dr. Wiese 
is, I believe, a very good authority, and he is referred to 
with much respect in Mr. Matthew Arnold's report. It 
is very instructive to compare his remarks on the com- 
parative merits of English and German education wnth 
what our own authorities have said on the subject. For 

* [Another edition, translated by Leonard Schmitz, was published in 
London, 1877, and though out of print is still obtainable.] 



318 APPENDIX. 

the benefit of those of my readers who have not ready 
access to the book, I give the following extracts: 

" The differences that exist between Jthe objects and 
attainments of the systems of instruction in use in the 
English public schools and our gymnasia may be 
summed up as exhibiting the contrast between skill and 
science [Konnen und Wmen), practice and knowledge. 
The knowledge of the English scholar is limited to a 
narrower circle than chat of the German; but he will 
generally be found to move in it with greater accuracy; 
his knowledge lies in a narrower compass, but generally 
serves more as a practical power to him." — (p. 59.) 

" I am persuaded that they are right who maintain 
that what the English schools and universities have neg- 
lected and do neglect, is amply compensated by that 
which they have done and are still doing." — (p. 6.) 

"I think I have generally observed, that the English 
public schools, without exception — with all their unde- 
niable shortcomings — yet do know how to guard and to 
strengthen in the rising generation the germ of future 
manhood; whereas we are not in a j^osition to repel the 
reproaches so frequently heaped of late years on our 
German schools, * that they hav^e forgotten their busi- 
ness of education, and train up no men for the Common- 
wealth;' though in making this reproach there is 
much so utterly overlooked, as to make it, in the mouths 
of most people, an unjust one. The result of my obser- 
vations, to state it briefly, is this: in knowledge, our 
higher schools are far in advance of the English; but 
their education is more effective, because it imparts a 
better preparation for life." — (p. 1.) 

"The general impression in England is, that the ac- 



ENGLISH VS. GERMAN SCHOOLS. 319 

quisition of knowledge is but the second object of edu- 
cation, and one for which opportunity is continally 
offering through life, but that to enable a young man to 
seize upon this opportunity, and to avail himself of it, 
the first object of education, viz., formation of character, 
must be obtained early; for that deficiency in this re- 
spect is not so easily supplied in after-life. We G-er- 
mans should reply that it is just in the power of form- 
ing character, that the excellence of well-regulated 
scientific instruction consists; but must we not confess 
that in numberless cases this result has mot shown itself 
in our young men ? Even in Germany most teachers 
maintain that the main object of instruction is educa- 
tion; but does not their confidence, that this object is 
best effected by its own means, too soon degenerate into 
carelessness ? " — (p. 50.) 

" England has the incalculable advantage of possess- 
ing a definite mode of training, handed down from gen- 
eration to generation, and in all essential points un- 
changed for centuries; and, above all, the advantages 
of a fixed central point [Nationality and Religion], 
toward which everything else radiates: we are involved 
in uncertainty, and go on looking and looking for some- 
thing that may remain steadfast: we allow things only 
valuable as means, to assume the importance of ends, 
and towards these all the powers we possess are enthusi- 
astically directed. The consequence is, alas ! that sooner 
or later, by the very necessity of things, there ensues a 
a reactionary movement in exactly the opposite direc- 
tion."— (p. 79.) 

" I have often been struck with the fact that the Eng- 
lish are beginning to fear that the heroic feeling of noble 



320 APPENDIX. 

manliness is gradually dying out of the nation, and 
therefore are rather shy of making any great altera- 
tions in the old system of education at the public schools 
and universities in order to meet the wants of modern 
times; or of making experiments of new systems and 
subjects of study, feeling as they do how much they 
owe to the old system for the rousing and fostering of 
that vital energy. They find that the times most favor- 
able to ti}e formation of strong individual character, 
were those in which the means of training were simple, 
and (owing to their small compass) capable perhaps of 
exercising a more certain influence. Therefore they are 
in general far from considering the variety of our Ger- 
man plan of study a thing to be envied." — (pp. 55, 56.) 
"The ideality of the German mind, and its leaning 
toward the abstract, makes it feel a respect for knowl- 
edge for its- own sake, such as hardly exists in England; 
it possesses for us an intrinsic value. To take a popular 
illustration, the knowledge that the earth is round, is 
considered by us valuable on its own account; the Eng- 
lishman receives this result of scientific research with 
equal pleasure; but chiefly because he associates it with 
the, thought of being able to sail around it; he asks, 
' How does it affect me ? ' Considerations of profit are 
doubtless closely allied with this mode of thought; but 
it would be extremely unjust, were we on this account 
to reproach the education of the higher schools in Eng- 
land with utilitarianism; it is a cause of complaint in 
many quarters, that they are not utilitarian enough. 
The state of the case is pretty much as follows: in Eng- 
land they look to the final object of education, and find 
this to consist in capability for action; even as our own 



ENGLISH VS. GERMAN SCHOOLS. 321 

Wilbelm von Humboldt once said, when he was Minis- 
ter, that there was nothing which the State ought so 
much to encourage amongst its youth, as that which had 
a tendency to promote energy of action. Under this 
belief the English reject everything from their system 
of instruction which may tend to oppress, to over-excite, 
or to dissipate the mental power of the pupil. Their 
means and methods of instruction would appear to the 
teacher of a German gymnasium surprisingly simple, 
not to say unscientific; and so in many cases they cer- 
tainly are. The English boy, even when his school- 
training is over, would seem generally to know little 
enough by the side of a German; and in certain subjects, 
such as geography, an English scholar is not to be com- 
pared with a German who has ' been taught on rational 
principles,' and the same may be said of physics and 
other branches of knowledge. With us it is almost a 
standing maxim, that the object of the gymnasium is to 
awaken and develop the scientific mind. An English- 
man could not admit this, for he is unable to divest him- 
self of the idea, that not to know, but to do, is the 
object of man's life; the vigorous independence of each 
individual man is his own life and calling." — (pp 63 ff.) 
"In the Gymnasia, Herder warned them against the 
luxury of knowledge: and how frequently we hear the 
reproach, that their lessons are such as become a uni- 
versity rather than a school; and that consequently the 
boys are conceited, premature critics and phrasemongers. 
In England they care only for facts: they reject all 
critical controversy, and desire by the contemplation of 
facts to sharpen the faculty of observation. We, on the 
other hand, too often allow reflection and generalities 

T 



322 APPENDIX. 

that cost but little labor^ to stifle that spirit of research 
which fixes itself upon the object and works toward it 
with scrupulous impartiality. How many a professor 
has been vexed at finding schoolboys bringing to college 
so many cut and dried thoughts and views, and so little 
well-grounded knowledge of simple matters of fact? 
Godfrey Hermann complained, ' At school they read 
authors critically, and we must begin at the university 
to teach them the elements of grammar.' I do not 
know whether pride of knowledge is so common now 
in Germany, as it was when Litchenberg spoke of it as 
^ a country in which children learned to turn up their 
noses before they learned to blow them,' but this I do 
know, that all pushing of the powers of thought brings 
its own punishment afterward. If young men are made 
acquainted before their time, and without pains on their 
part, with those results of knowledge which are fitted 
for a more advanced period of life, they are very likely 
to use up the stock of enthusiasm, which we all need and 
have received as a kind of dower to carry with us 
through life, and which we can best increase by over- 
coming difficulties for ourselves." — (pp. 6Q, 61.) 

" Thus Dr. Arnold says that the effort a boy makes 
is a hundred times more valuable to him than the knowl- 
edge acquired as the result of the effort; as generally in 
education the Mow is more important than the TFhat. 
The consequence of this being so often forgotten in Ger- 
man schools, of their not sufficiently guarding against 
the encyclopaedic tendency of their system of study is, 
that a young man loses not only the natural simplicity 
and coherence of his idea, but yet more his capacity to 
observe, because he has been over-crammed; his brain 



ENGLISH VS. GERMAN SCHOOLS. 323 

becomes confused and Lis ear deafened; and after all he 
is obliged to bestow his labor rather on account of the 
extent than the depth of the knowledge to be attained. 
In English schools they have hitherto avoided this dan- 
ger by confining themselves to very little; students there 
do not leara nearly so much as with us, but they learn 
one thing better, and that is the art of learning. They 
acquire a greater power of judging for themselves; they 
know how to take a correct starting-point for other 
studies; whereas our young men too often only know 
just what they have learnt, and never cease to be de- 
pendent on their school-teaching." — (pp. 68, 69.) 

" It can not be denied that the maxim, ' non scholce sed 
vitiB ' [not for school but for life], is better understood in 
England than in Germany. All that a school can teach, 
beyond imparting a certain small stock of knowledge, is 
the way to learn. It is a lamentable misconception of that 
most important maxim, to suppose that a liberal educa- 
tion can have any other end in view, than to impart and 
exercise power to be used in after-life." — (p. 76.) 

"I am persuaded that we must soon make up our 
minds once more to simplify our course of study, and the 
regulations for the last school examination [Arhiturienten- 
examen).^^ — (p, 77.) 

" Were it possible to combine the German scientific 
method with the English power of forming the character, 
we should attain an idea of education not yet realized in 
Christian times, only once realized perhaps in any time, 
— in the best days of Greece; but which is just the more 
difficult to attain now, in proportion as the spirit of 
Christianity is more exalted than anything which an- 
tiquity could propose to itself as the end of education." 
—(p. 209.) 



INDEX. 



Accomplishments, value of, 236 
Activity stimulated, 191, 263, 321 
Actors as good company, 104 
JEsop's Fables, lOl, 105, 266, 268 
.Esthetic culture, 55, 190, 202, 235, 

237, 239 
Aim of education, 114, 182, 205, 227 
A little well learned, 207,218- 
Amateur scientists, 231 
Analysis vs. synthesis, 46 
Andra, J. v., 58 
Apparatus needed, 72, 247 
Aquaviva, 18 
Arcesilaus, 44 
Aristotle, q., 69 
Arithmetic, 149, 189 
Arnold, M., q., 102, 135, 137, 223 
Arnold. Thos., 85, 233, 239, 270, 280, 

322 
Ascham, 35-42, 45, 67 
—and Jacotot, 208, 210 
—and Ratich, 52 
Attention, securing, 27, 171, 191,248, 

257 
Attractive methods (see Learning) 
Augsburg, Ratich at, 48 
Auschauung, 18S 
Austen, Miss, q., 217 
Axiomatic truths, 301 
Bacon 

—and Jesuits, 17 
—and Comenius, 58, 61, 67 
Bain, q., 258 
Basedow, 138-155 
—and Pestalozzi, 190, 191 
Batty and Comenius, 76 
Bayle, q., 59 



Benevolent superintendence, 184 
Bernsdorf and Basedow, 140 
Bible as text-book, 51, 73, 101, 139, 

150, 284 
Biography before history, 272 
Bluntschli and Pestalozzi, 158, 163 
Bobadilla, 19 
Boileau, q., 135 
Books for the young, 271 
—only supplementary, 243 
Borgia, 19 

Bowels, regular action of, 88 
Boy at nine years, 274 
—at twelve years, 112, 131. 178 
Browning, Oscar, q., 53 
Bulvver, q., 176 
Burgdorf, Pestalozzi at, 173 
Burke, q., 222 
Caecilius, 58 
Cambridge tripos, 212 
—vs. Oxford, 213 
Cam pane 11a. 58 
Campe, 153 
Canisius, 19 
Carlyle, q.,252 
Cat as a model, 118 
Change at twelve years, 131 
Character from companions, 85 
—of teacher, 277 
Checking of children, 94 
Childhood sacrificed, 115, 178 
—vs. youth, 178 
Children as children, 150 
Christopher and Alice, 167 
Civil government, 106 
Class matches, 23, 288 
Code of the Jesuits, 18 



326 



INDEX. 



Co-ercive teaching, 50, 95 

Colet, 35, 292 

Comenius, 56-80 

—and Jacotot, 208 

—and Locke, 92 

—and Milton, 79 

—and Pestalozzi, 75 

—and Raticli, 52 

—summary of principles, 68 

Committing to memory, 49, 104, 120, 

209 
Composition exercises, 104, 221, 267 
Compulsion in occupation, 95 
Concrete to abstract, 46, 246 
Cowley, q., 297 
Criticism, premature, 322 
Curiosity fostered, 133 
Dancing, importance, 94 
Davies, Emily, q., 86, 93 
Declamation, condemned, 120 
De Geer, Lawrence, 66 
—Lewis, 62 

De Morgan, Prof., q., 312 
De Quincy, q., 85, 282 
Descartes, q., 17, 62 
Desire for knowledge, 123, 133, 216 
Dessau, Basedow at, 143 
Desultory reading, 311 
Dictation lessons, 266 
Didactica Magna, 59, 63,68, 75 
Dion Prussaeus, 41 
Disciplinary studies, 211, 212, 215, 

225, 252, 257, 318 
Discipline, 90, 93 
Division of hours, 152 
Double translation, 40, 52 
Drawing, 106, 120, 190, 202 
Drummond, q., 286 
Dull teaching defended, 252 
Dupanloup, q., 102 
Early teaching, 176 
Edgeworth, q.. 246 
Editions of books. 53, 57, SO, 136, 166, 

167, 194, 197. 254, 317 
Education through play, 72, 120 
— in suffering, 129 



—of a gentleman, 82 

—of opinion, 286 

Elbing, Comenius at, 63 

Elizabeth, Queen, 41 

Emerson, q. , 285 
I Emile, 108-137, 135 
I Empirical to rational, 247 
' Emulation and rewards, 23, 72, 288 
I England, Comenius in, 60 
I English ed'l theory, 213 
! —literature, claims of, 216 
I —Schools vs. German, 316 
i Enigmas given, 72 
I Enthusiasm of humanity, 182 
j Equal capacity for learning, 198 
! Erasmus, 35 

! Ernest of Weimar, Prince, 48 
I Eton Latin Grammar, 214 
I Evening Hour of a Hermit, 165, 305 
i Examinations, 72, 137 
j Exertion encouraged, 191 
i Experiment and analysis, 50 
j Fables and allegories, 72 
j Facts to be learned, 216, 321 
j Familiarity with subject, 218 
! Fellenburg and Pestalozzi, 174 
: Firmness, 129 

j Formal religious teaching, 284 
I —teaching, 281 
I Franklin, q., 265 
I Fred's Journey to Dessau, 147 
; Freedom from restraint 111 
j French, importance of, 100, 146 
i —methods, 146, 198 
j Fronde, q., 287 

Functions of a tutor, 96, 116 
! Fundanius, 64 
I Generalities vs. facts, 321 

Genesis of knowledge, 247 

Gentlemen's education, 82 

Geography teaching, 217, 273 

Glaumius, 58 

Goethe, v., 209, 270 

—and Basedow, 141 

Gogmagogs, 212 
! Good breeding, 94 



INDEX. 



327 



—spirits in teacher, 281 

Grammar, 102, 221 

—and literature, 300 

Greek, importance of, 45, 106, 241 

Grube Method, 195 

Guillard, Achille, q.,223 

Gymnastics, first use, 152 

Hack's Winter Evenings, 274 

Hamilton, 81, 181 

Handelschulen, 230 

Hands and voice, 74 

Hartlib, 60 

—and Comenius, 64 

—and Milton, 53 

Head-master's influence, 85 

Health of pupils, 29 

Helps, q., 232, 286, 310 

Helvicus, q., 47, 48,58 

Hermann, Godfrey, q., 322 

History teaching, 217, 234, 235, 256, 

268, 271 
Hoose's Pestalozzian Arithmetics, 195 
Hope, A. R., q., 282 
How vs. What, 322 
" Human " vs. material, 300 
Idleness indulged, 112 
Indefinite to definite, 246 
Indifference of teachers, 193, 253,256 
Industrial education, 107, 135 
Influence of leading boys, 283 
Innocence hazarded, 83 
Innovators, the, 45, 54, 101 
Instruction, definition, 217 
Intellectual education, 186, 240 
—vigor, 132 

Independence of facts, 219, 311 
Interest aroused, 257, 270 
—essential, 259 
—of the teacher, 192 
Jacotot, 196-223 
—and Hamilton, 210 
—and Spencer 209, 212, 214, 217 
—and Vogel, 264 
—his paradoxes, 198 
—his rales, 219 
—his special work, 222 



Janua Linguarum, 59, 66, 68, 73, 75 

78, 80, 303 

Jesuits, 17-34, 45 

—and Comenius, 71, 75 

—and Jacotot, 204, 208 

Johnson, Dr., q., 36,299 

Jonson, Ben, q., 282 

Jouvency, q., 24-27, 32 

Juvenants, 19 

Kant, q., 140 

—and Basedow, 153 

Kingdon, E. G., q., 24 

Knight's School History, 272 

Knowledge and power, 215, 323 

—for itself, 320 

—vs. power, 211, 212, 215, 225, 252, 

257, 318 
Known to unknown, 242, 263 
Kothen, Ratich at, 48 
Kromayer, 52 
Kriisi, 173 
Lainez, 19 

Language lessons, 102, 187, 221 
Large vs. small schools, 282 
Latin, importance, 26, 31, 45, 48, 54, 

69, 100, 146. 214, 229, 239, 241, 255 
—methods, 35, 37, 51, 54, 70, 73, 76, 

100, 101, 146, 148, 201, 217, 245, 289, 

290, 292 
Lavater and Basedow, 141 
—and Pestalozzi, 158, 167 
Learning disparaged, 98 
—made attractive, 32, 46, 50, 54, 69, 

71, 95, 98, 151, 191, 249, 250 
—the Index, 269 
—vs. development, 276 
Leisure, part of education, 235-237 
—value of, 282 
Le Maire, 62 

Length of school-hours, 25 
Leonard and Gertrude, 165, 166 
Leopald of Dessau, Prince, 143 
Lessing, q., 202 
Leszno, Comenius at, 58, 65 
Letters on Early Education, 195 
Lewis of Anhalt-KOthen, 48 



328 



INDEX. 



Liberty as a panacea, 127 
Lily's Grammar, 35, 100, 290. 
Litchenberg, q., 322 
Little, but tiioroiighly, 49, 132, 264 

312, 320 
Little learning dangerous, 231 
Locke, 42, 81-107 
—and Pestalozzi, 190, 191 
—and Eousseau, 88, 135 
—notion of education, 97 
—on sugar, 251 
—summary of principles, 107 
Logic disparaged, 105 
Long, George, q., 36 
Love- Letter of Pestalozzi, 160 
Lowe, Mr., 124 
Macaulay for boys, 270 
MangnalVs Questions, 179, 271, 313 
Manual training, 135 
Marcel, q., 301 

Maternity, instruction in, 149 
Mathematics, memory in, 218 
Matthison, 153 
Maurice, Prince, 47 
Mayor, J. E. B.,q.,36 
Medecines avoided, 88 
Memorizing, 49, 104, 120, 209 
Memory, value of, 216 
Menalk and Pestalozzi, 161 
Mental discipline, (see Disciplin 

ary.) 
Merivale, Herman, 135 
Mersenne, 62 

Methodology, truths of, 301 
Methodus Linguarum iVov., 65, 68 
Mill, J. S., q.,229, 234, 238 
Milton, John, 53-55, 67 
Mind and memory, 74^' ' [J'J^ 

Model boy, Rousseau's, 112 
Modelling, 191 

Money-getting education, 229, 238 
Montaigne, 42-44, 45, 67, 130, 132, 202 
—and Jacotot, 209 
—and Locke, 89 
—and Rousseau, 109 



Moral behavior, 116, 125 

—and religious education, 276-287 

—tone of large schools, 282 

—training, 185 

Moravian brethren, 57, 58, 65 

Most critical period, 111 

—reckless innovator, 109, 110 

Mothers as teachers, 183 

Motion and noise, 151 

Mozart, 204, 218 

Mulcaster, 45, 293 

Music, value of, 106, 120, 190. 

—methods, 202 

—in religion. 285 

Natural instruction, 46, 49, 69, 72, 
110, 124, 144, 147 

—philosophy, 106 

Naturalness in teachers, 278 
I Near things first, 124, 260 
i Negative education, ill 
, Neuhof, Pestalozzi at, 159 
I Niederer and Schmid, 175 
1 North, Thos., q., 273 
; Nothing to be forgotten, 210 

Object lessons, 117, 144, 171, 177, 188, 
261 

Observation and reflection, 187 

One thing at a time, 49 

Open-airiness, 86 

Orbis P ictus, 59, 66, 68, 79, 80, 142 
I Originality encouraged, 31 
j Oxenstiern.q., 62 
I Palmer, q., 164 

PansopMae Prodromus, 58, 60 

Painting disparaged, 106 
! Paradoxes of Jacotot, 198 
j Parental education, 232, 
I Parent's part in education, 72 
^ I Payne, Joseph, q., 196-223, 313 
' I —editions of Lectures, 196, 197 
Pedagogy only from teachers, 224 

Penmanship, 99 

Pestalozzi, 156-176 

—and Jacotot, 208 

—and Ramsauer, 308 

—and Spencer, 247, 261 

—root of his system, 182 



INDEX. 



,3^9 



Pestalozziaaism, 176-195 

Pliilanthropin, 138-155 

—description of, 147 

Physical education, 46, 228 

—vs. training, 238 

—training, 55, 86, 107, 111, 180, 190 

Pictures valuable, 261 

—maps, models, etc., 72 

Piayinginto spelling, 99 

Pleasure a means, 259 

Plutarch's Lives, 273 

Poetry, value, 104, 139, 237, 266, 304 

Pope, q., 298 

Popularity of Jesuits, 30 

Prayer in schools. 286 

"Preparatory schools," 179, 283 

Primary teachers, 180 

Private vs. public education, 82 

Prodigies of learning, 123 

Psychology important, 240 

Punishment, 29, 72, 130 

—corporal, 92, 94, 139 

Pupil's influence, 84 

Quaalen, Herr von, 138 

Quadrivium, 45 

Qualifications of a tutor, 96, 116 

Eacine, 135 

Ramsauer, q., 172, 308 

Ratich, 46-52, 67 

—and Comenius, 57, 58, 63, 73 

—and Jacotot, 208-210 

Ranke, q.. 31 

Raumer, q., 45, 51, 139, 175, 194 

Reading, 220, 262, 26.5, 310 

Reading-books, 264 

" Real" knowledge, 101 

Realists and idealists. 278 

Reasoning with children, 96 

Reflection, 219 

Reformers as a class, 108 

Reiner's Lessons in Numher, 195 

Relative value of knowledges, 227, 

239 
Religious differences, 45, 48, 57, 66. 

67, 139 
—instruction, 99, 146, 284 



! Repetition, 27, 49, 219 

j Repression, 94, 117 

i " Rewarding " effort, 260 

j RewardSr94 

i Rhenius, 58 

i Ritterus, 58 

1 Robinson Crusoe, 126, 153 

i Robinson, R., q., 267 

I Rousseau, 42, 108-137 

—and Basedow, 110, 122, 139, 144 
j —and Jacotot, 209 

—and Locke, 109 

—and Pestalozzi. 110, 117, 136, 157, 
159, 163, 196 

—and Spencer, 130 

Routine teaching, 280 

Sacchini, q., 29, 32, 33 

Salmeron, 19 

Salzmac, 153 

Saros-Patak model school, 65 

Schmid, q., 19, 29, 185 

School-building pleasant, 72 

School -teaching a failure, 257 

Schuramell, Herr, q., 147 

Science of education, 240 

Science teaching, 103, 117, 132, 202, 
230, 238, 241 

Seeley, Prof., q., 216, 245 

Self-denial cultivated, 90 

Self-dependence, 185, 248 

Self-direction limited, 201 

Self-government, 130 

Seif-instruction, 46, 197, 201 

Self-preservative knowledge, 228 

Seneca, 88, 130 

Sense-instruction, 46, 71, 116, 118, 
144 

Service in schools, 285 

Sheldon's Object-Lessons, 195 

Simple to complex, 242 

Skyte, John, 62 

Smith, Sydney, q., 181 

Socrates, 44, 223 

Special education, 100, 184, 230 

Spelling, 23, 221, 288 



830 



IXDEX, 



Spencer, 87, 177, 202, 224-254 

—follows Comenius, 75 

—principles, 242 

—summary of criticism, 238 

Stadias, 57 

Stanley, Lord, q., 117, 21/) 

Stanz, Pestalozzi at, 169 

Stephens, James, q., 311 

Sturm, 45 

Subjects made interesting, 259 

Sweden, Comenius in, 62 

Sympathy with children, 116 

Systematic education, 70, 311 

Systems of schools, 74 

Teaching definitions, 199, 200 

—narrows, 280 

--too long, 281 

—what one does not know, 199 

Telemaque, 198, 206, 210 

Text-books, attractive, 265 

Thing before attribute, 50 

Things vs. representations, 122 

—knowledge of, 45, 101 

Thoroughness, 28 

Thoughts and suggestions, 255-275 

Tom Brown at Rugby, 271 

Tonic Sol-Fa, 120 

Tout est dans tout, 206, 219 

Tracing in penmanship, 100 

Travel for education, 74, 107, 234 

Trivium, 45 



Tutors, private, 82 
Tyndall,75, 202, 253 
Unconscious tuition, 277 
Uniformity of method, 49 
Universities, English, 30 
'• Useful Knowledge,'* 273 
Variety of methods, 266 
Verification of knowledge, 220 
Vernacular before Latin, 45,46,78, 

103, 139. 245, 293 
Verse-making, 104 
Vices in public schools, 84 
Villa Dei, A. de, 35, 289 
Virtue and reason, 90 
Vitality in childhood, 117 
Vogel's system, 262 
Waking children gently, 89 
Walmisley, Prof., q., 218 
Weise, q., 316 
Williams, David, q., 135 
Wilson, M , q., 133, 197, 202, 205, 206 
Wolsey, q., 35, 36 
Work of a tutor, 97 
Words and things, 45, 54, 70, 72, 121, 

134, 209, 296-301 
—unintelligible, 122 
Wordsworth, q., 258, 280 
" Young ladies' " schools, 217 
Youth in teachers, 116 
Yverdun, Pestalozzi at, 174 



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